South from Yellowstone to Grand Canyon and beyond

-------------------

Saturday, 11 October -

This morning we woke late-- almost 0900-- probably because we stayed up late watching the movie last night. The temperature this morning was a pleasant 43 degrees outside, 53 inside and we have yet another sunny, 70-plus day on tap.
After a quick breakfast we continued up Route 67 to 89 at Jacob’s Lake and saw that the campground we thought might be closed was indeed open. No regrets, though. Our freebie site on FR205 was near a trailhead for the Arizona Trail and was in a very nice spot.
We then drove east and very soon were at the Vermilion Cliffs National Monument, a massive red bluff extending for miles. What an incredible sight as we descended from an altitude of 8000 feet to the valley floor at 5000 feet.
We drove through the morning, arriving at Tuba City shortly after lunch time. Labashi was again hungering for a Big Mac so we hit the local McDonald’s. This one was an extra-interesting one with all the Navajo and Hopi faces. I chuckled to see young Navajo teenage girls excitedly engaged with their smartphones, just like teenagers everywhere.
After gassing up and icing up in Tuba City, we continued across Route 160 to Kayenta. We had originally planned to take 163 up through Monument Valley but we’ve done that route before and decided we needed to save some time and miles to get to Mesa Verde yet today.
We continued across 160 and entered Colorado and on to Cortez, where we stopped at a Wal-mart to re-supply for the next few days. Along the way we stopped at the first cell towers we saw to call Labashi’s Mom and Dad to check in.
After Wal-mart we just had a short drive up to Mesa Verde National Park. We checked in at the campground registration station and found our campsite for the night about a half-hour before dark. Cost tonight was an expensive (for us) $17.50 but we’ve been getting so many freebies lately that on average we’re doing very well.
While Labashi made supper I went up a few sites and talked with an older guy camping in a Jucy van. We had seen these colorful vans in New Zealand and the guy told me they are indeed a New Zealand company now expanding into California and Salt Lake City. The van is based on a typical suburban mini-van with a small kitchen unit accessible from the rear hatch. The unique thing about several of these I’ve seen is a ‘penthouse’, or roof-top tent contained in a roof-top cargo carrier (like a Thule ski carrier, only bigger). The renter in this case was a gentleman from Rome. He told me his wife is visiting Berkeley to do research and he’s retired so took off for a few weeks. She’ll join him later.
After supper, we turned to the laptops. Believe it or not we have an excellent wi-fi signal throughout the campground!

------------------

Friday, 10 October -

Overnight we had a magnificent full moon and the temperature hovered around the freezing mark. We slept very well in the ultra-quiet of the wilderness.
After breakfast we headed down the mountain to the Grand Canyon north rim entrance. Once again my senior pass did its magic and got us into the park for free.
We drove to the visitor services area and walked through the visitor center, gift shop, and Grand Canyon Lodge. We walked out the Bright Angel Trail atop a massive knife-edge formation, trying not to look down as the trail sides fell away to oblivion on both sides of our three-foot-wide paved path.
We thought we might have lunch at the Lodge but they have a breakfast-to-lunch turnover period and we were hungry so we abandoned that idea and went back to the van. Labashi made us nice salami sandwiches with bread from the German bakery we stopped at yesterday.
We then drove out to Cape Royal and walked out to the viewpoint and took a few photos. We hit a few more viewpoints as we came back and parked at the trailhead for a hike out to Cape Final.
Our walk was about two miles of rolling terrain through very nice Ponderosa pine forest. Some of the trees had to be close to four feet in diameter. Their rugged bark and the occasional waft of scent from them as you walk down the trail is just magnificent.
The trail took us first to several overlooks, then finally up atop a massive rock with 270-degree views of the Grand Canyon. The other 90 degrees looked back over the pine-covered escarpment we had just come through. I took photos of two of the three geodetic markers.... the third was just too risky.
We walked back in very pleasant evening light, struggling a bit with the uphills at this altitude. We put in 4.5 miles with this hike but with the other walks today we did over 19,300 steps (8.6 miles) and 70 flights of stairs according to the Fitbit.
We drove back to the main road and, since we knew we wouldn’t be able to get a campsite in the park, drove north out of the park. We tried the DeMott Campground run by the Forest Service but it was filled. We headed north to the next Forest Service campground at Jacob Lake but then saw a note on one of the maps saying it’s only open in summer. We dug out the Kaibab National Forest map and looked for possible dispersed camping sites, i.e., places we could camp at a pull-off or trailhead. We saw a trailhead off Forest Road 205 and thought we’d check that area as a possible fall-back position, then go on to Jacob Lake and hope the OTHER information we had about it being open into November was correct. However, when we saw a nice site near the trailhead, we elected to stay there instead of going on. Good decision!
After a fine supper of split-pea soup and the last of our German-bakery rolls, we spent the evening on our laptops for awhile, then watched a movie on DVD-- ‘Eagle Eye’. What a farce.

------------------

Thursday, 9 October -

The overnight temperature was a nice 40 degrees here at 8000 feet in Bryce Canyon National Park, a pleasant surprise indeed.
After breakfast we drove to Sunset Point and donned our day-packs for the Navajo Loop walk into the canyon. The round trip is only a bit over two miles but it’s a steep descent of .7 miles a bit of respite at the bottom, then a very steep .8-mile slog back to the rim. But the walk was completely worth it. The stroll downhill was fairly steep--- enough that you wouldn’t dare try it on a wet trail--- and looking over the switchbacks was dizzying.
When finally the trail leveled out a bit, the hoodoos opened up to a small valley filled with Ponderosa pines. But as soon as you hit bottom and the trail junction there, you started climbing. And at 7500 feet, the climb was a strain.
The walk down had been fairly open but the climb back up wound through very narrow slot canyons-- a spectacular sight.
Once back at the top, we drove down the main park road a few miles and parked at a picnic pulloff for lunch. We then hit a few more overlooks before heading out of the park.
Our goal for the day was the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. We spent the afternoon wending our way down US89 to Kanab, Utah, and into Arizona. At Freedonia, we stopped at the Kaibab National Forest ranger station for info. As we stared at the maps, I asked if there happened to be a good gravel road we might explore. The ranger directed us to Forest Road 22, a former logging road, which was about 50 miles long and leads down to Route 67 near the campground he recommended for us.
We took FR22 with some trepidation since you never know quite how bad a gravel road will be. This one was indeed wide and well-maintained for the most part though we have a few stretches of heavy washboards to deal with.
FR22 wound through sage-brush territory for almost 20 miles, then began rising into the mountain. We soon were cruising at a steady 25 miles per hour through Ponderosa pines and a very open understory.
We spent the rest of the afternoon making our way across FR22. When we hit FR406, we saw signs for vistas but without mileage indications. We detoured for five miles or so but soon realized the vistas were actually much further away and turned back.
By that time it was after 1700 and we knew of a trailhead not far from the intersection of FR22 and 406. We drove back to the trailhead and decided it would be our campsite for the night.
Before supper we walked back the trail about a mile, slowly descending all the way. That gave us an uphill walk back to the van and we declared the day a success with 12,000 Fitbit steps and some 60 flights of stairs.
After supper, we spent the evening catching up the blog (me) and doing some video editing (Labashi).

--------------------

Wednesday, 8 October -

After showers this morning at Jordanelle State Park, we headed south down the dotted-road (the scenic road) to Provo and then on down US89 (more dots!) through wonderfully scenic ranch country to Panguich. It was an all-day drive but so worth it.
We then continued on to Bryce Canyon National Park and selected a campsite in the North Campground and toured the visitors’ center. We then went to the historic Bryce Canyon Lodge, thinking we might have dinner there but in the end decided we’d just go ahead and have dinner in the van and better control our time before tonight’s program at the lodge auditorium.
At 1900 we went into the lodge auditorium for the 1930 program. We were way-early of course but that just gave us a chance to chat with the park geologist before his presentation. He’s a former college professor who now serves as a volunteer geologist-- the only one in the national parks system--- and lives in one of the historic residences in the park. His hour-long presentation about the ‘grand staircase’ of geologic wonders leading from the Grand Canyon to Bryce Canyon was the best geology lecture I’ve experienced. I was surprised the general national-park audience was up for it but his presentation was generously applauded.
After the lecture we returned to our campsite and took a short moonlight walk along the rim. The day had been quite nice and the evening downright balmy for an 8000-foot altitude.

---------------------

Tuesday, 7 October -

We left Blowout Campground this morning after a mild night-- about 40 degrees. We have no idea why it’s called ‘Blowout’ campground but assume it has something to do with construction of the reservoir.
As we followed the reservoir we noticed it’s down quite a bit but we don’t know if that’s seasonal or of special concern.
We followed US89 into Wyoming at Alpine and then back into Idaho at Montpelier. As we approached Montpelier we recognized the Montpelier Canyon Campground where we had stayed in 2009 during our Oregon Trail trip. That prompted us to remember we had tried to visit the Oregon-California Trails Center in Montpelier but it had been closed at the time.
This time the Trail Center appeared to be closed but the gift shop was open. When we asked about the Living History tours, the woman at the desk said there was a wagonmaster on call to take tours if we were interested. By that time another couple arrived and we took the tour together. WagonMaster Dave led us through a series of rooms representing key milestones on the trip. We started from a wagon-train outfitter in Independence, Missouri where we learned what life on the trail would be like--- including the fact that 1/6th of people starting out on the journey died along the way.
We proceeded through several campsites along the way as we learned more about life on the wagon-train. The final camp was at Clear Creek--- right here under our feet at Montpelier. Dave told us even the campfires in the dirt-floored room we were in had been placed on the sites of historic campfires of Oregon Trail pioneers.
After Montpelier we headed south toward Utah, skirting Bear Lake. In Garden City we had milkshakes. The traditional milkshakes to have here are raspberry ones, apparently because there’s an abundant raspberry harvest each year.
We continued around Bear Lake and instead of going toward Salt Lake City, we took the less-traveled route to Evanston, Wyoming.
There we joined Interstate 80 West toward Salt Lake, However, we took the Heber/Provo exit so we could visit Park City, home of the Sundance Film Festival each winter and a massive ski resort.
We found our campsite for the night at Jordanelle State Park and then drove into Park City for supper. We walked from the bottom of Main Street up through the historic district and found Le Bistro, a nice little French restaurant. We elected to go with various starter dishes to have a variety of tastes. We shared a pear-almond salad, spring rolls, a forest mushrooms-on-toast dish, figs and duck carpaccio, and cocktails. The tastes were wonderful and we were so glad we had happened upon this restaurant.
After dinner we walked up to the head of Main Street and then back to the van parked off the bottom of it. We were surprised to see how dead Park City was tonight. Obviously we’re out of season but the weather has been magnificent so it seems a shame there weren’t more people out to enjoy it. On the other hand, we had it more or less to ourselves!
After our walk we returned to the campground at Jordanelle State Park and turned in.

-----------------------

Monday, 6 October -

I slept very well in the 30-degree overnight weather but Labashi said she was awake until quite late. We can’t figure that one out--- we certainly had enough exercise. Last time I looked at the Fitbit yesterday evening we had done over 17,500 steps for the day.
Today’s major task was to find a wi-fi source so I could hook up to the Internet and update my credit card information for all the bills we have automatically paid while we travel. As I noted in an earlier post, our regular card was caught up in the Home Depot compromise and while in Custer, South Dakota our card suddenly began being rejected.
We went through this same thing less than a year ago for the Target compromise so I knew from the get-go it was going to be a slog. The online systems for many of these companies are in some cases poor beyond belief.
We tried the West Yellowstone Library but they’re closed on Mondays. But I did learn that free wi-fi is available in the Yellowstone Visitor’s Center nearby.
I started off with our Netflix bill and that one was resolved in only a minute or two. But the next one was a nightmare. I worked for 20 minutes just trying to sign on and when that failed to have my password sent to me. Absolutely everything failed. At one point it told me it didn’t have any record of my email address--- the same one it had used to send me a notice that my monthly transaction had failed. There was no number to contact anyone about it so I had to send an email. As I worked on other accounts, I received a response with a phone number. The agent told me their system does not work with Mac computers, iPhones, or iPads because Apple has too much security in their firewalls!!!!! And you couldn’t just detect I was coming from an Apple machine and tell me that? The agent then started to tell me how to go online with a Windows machine to make the change. When I said I had no such machine, she agreed to handle it over the phone--- it took only a minute to update my card.
I then had a similar problem with Tracfone. The update-the-credit-card function simply would not work. I couldn’t change any fields on the form. I eventually blundered onto a way to ADD a credit card, then reassign it to my phones.
ANYWAY, I had a series of absolutely unbelievable hassles just trying to update my credit card so the companies I could pay my bills. It took me three hours to work through my list of nine places I needed to make the change on the web.
While I worked on credit card stuff Labashi wrote an email to family and uploaded some photos and sent them off.
We then went to the local McDonalds for a quick lunch so we could get out of town yet this afternoon.
We drove south down Route 20 and then across the Mesa Scenic Parkway (Route 47) and stopped for a short walk to Upper Mesa Falls. In the parking lot I talked to a guy who was riding a 99 BMW 650 dual-sport and he asked me lots of questions about my F650GS twin.
We continued down the eastern-most roads in Idaho and could see the back side of the Tetons most of the way. The trees in the Targhee National Forest looked great--- none of the bark-beetle damage we saw elsewhere (including Yellowstone). Between the National Forest segments, we were in potato-harvesting country and there were loaded potato-hauling trucks everywhere. And there in the backdrop were the snow-covered Tetons--- incredibly beautiful on this sunny, mid-60’s day.
After Driggs we headed to Swan Valley and enjoyed the bottom-of-a-steep-walled-valley drive. As we drove, Labashi looked for campsites on the iPad app (Allstays Camp and RV) and found that almost all the campgrounds had closed the end of September. We finally found one a hundred miles away which was supposed to be open and set the GPS for it. We also decided, however, to check on a couple of the closed campgrounds to see if the gates are left open for campers who don’t need services. That turned out to be the case. We found Blowout Campground on Palisades Reservoir wasn’t gated and two of the dozen-or-so sites were occupied. We picked one overlooking the ultra-blue reservoir about an hour before dark and settled in.
After supper we went for a short walk just as the full moon came up over the mountain to our east. Wow! And this is free?????? Double-WOW!!!


******* END OF POST ***********