When we got up this morning the weather was cloudy and rainy again which meant no chance to see Antelope Canyon. We did some house cleaning and started on our way to Bryce Canyon.

Our first stop was the Grand Staircase – Escalante. There we hiked the Toadstool trail through a canyon to a fascinating colourful plateau. Despite the cloudy weather, the colors of the rock formations were vibrant. We had a really good time there with lots to photograph and very few people to get into our pictures.

Pepsi enjoyed the hike and was very cooperative during picture taking time and sat quietly until the click of the camera.

On the way we saw a big sign for a German bakery and restaurant in the next town. Since we hadn’t had lunch yet, we thought this is our opportunity. We were not disappointed. The bratwurst with sauerkraut and pickle were great and the German cake even better. We decided to buy some more cake and some nice crusty bread for the next couple of days.

Just outside of Bryce Canyon we stopped at Dixie National Forest Red Canyon and saw some beautiful red rocks and had to stop for some pictures.

Finally, we arrived at Bryce Canyon National Park. We were lucky to find a nice camping site directly in the park and then headed off to the viewpoints to see the sights. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find a parking spot for our van, so we headed back to the campground, parked it, and then took the free shuttle back to the Bryce viewpoint. We were so lucky. The cloudy skies cleared and the threat of a thunderstorm also disappeared. Just beautiful late afternoon sunshine to capture the splendour before us.

We hiked the Rim trail to Inspiration point and then wanted to take the shuttle back to our campground. Oops. There was no more shuttle. We had missed the fact that Utah is in Mountain time and Arizona is in Pacific time, although we were actually further west than we had been in Arizona. We had no choice but to walk the 3 kms back to the campground.