May 10, 2010 - Zion National Park to Bryce Canyon National Park (Utah)

Wow, I'm all caught up on blog posts.  Don't hold your breath cause I don't figure it will happen too regularly.

We made the 113 mile drive from Zion to Bryce Canyon National Park today.  We left Zion about 8:30 this morning to beat the majority of the traffic through the tunnel.  Again, we got the tunnel shut down so that we could drive right smack down the middle of it so both the RV and truck would clear it.

We did have our first skirmish between the truck and RV this morning as we left our campground.  Since we have a short bed truck, we have to have what is called a "slider" hitch that allows more sharp turns without the RV hitting the cab of the truck.  To leave the campground, we had it slide back and as we were pulling out of the campground onto the road, we heard this horrible noise as the trailer slide back some more.  We weren't quite sure what it was...  We stopped just before the park entrance to put the hitch back into normal mode and discovered a very nice hole through the tail gate of the truck and the tail gate jammed.  Matt got into the back of the truck and after kicking the tail gate multiple times, finally got it to open.  Well, as with everything else, the RV won!!  The truck now wears a duct tape bandage until we can get it fixed.

The rest of the drive was beautiful and the roads were in great shape.  We got to our campground, Ruby's Inn, just outside of the park entrance and our spot was ready for us even though we were early.  We finally got the thing level and then set off to explore the shuttle service for this park. 

Once inside the park, we rode the shuttle all the way down to the Overlook and then on the way back, got out at Sunset point and walked the mile back to Sunrise point.  A shuttle drive out of the park and we are now relaxing in the RV.

The weather here is quite chilly and windy.  Matt is planning on doing a sunset shot of the hoodoos and is going armed with his down jacket.  They are calling for snow to start here tonight and continue on into tomorrow with several inches possible.  Quite the difference from Zion even though they are so close.  Our elevation here is about 7700 feet.