52 Dates: #22 - Bryce Canyons

On Friday our friends the Isons called with a spur of the moment plan to hit up Bryce Canyons the next day. Apparently all the National Parks were free on Saturday, so we decided to go for it.  We drove up to Parowan Friday night after Cassie's surprise party and met up with the Isons there on Saturday morning.  Isaac also owns a few bee hives and was bringing them to Parowan for the summer anyway so Lyndi, Cannon, Daphne and I got to play at the house while the boys went off to do some bee whispering. :)

It was so fun to catch up with Lyndi, show her around Alan and Marie's awesome yard and watch the kiddos play together.  When the boys got back, we even had a moment to visit with Grandma Elaine (94 years old and still working in the garden!) as she showed us the beautiful plants in her yard, including a Daphne plant that apparently has small white blooms in the spring.

Daphne Baby with the Daphne Plant

We loaded up and drove to Panguitch where we stopped for subway sandwiches and ate at a park before driving the last 20 minutes into Bryce Canyons.  The drive to the park was almost as nice as the park itself!  Everything is still green (for the desert) and the mountain hills around each corner kept me ooing and ahhing.

Burke, Daphne, Isaac and Cannon

One thing that made this trip so enjoyable was the leisure pace we were able to set.  We didn't even get to the park until noon, but I wasn't worried about it because we weren't dishing out a lot of money to get in.  Likewise, I didn't feel like we had to do every hike or see every corner to make it worth our time and money.

Instead we did a small 3 mile hike looping through some of the landmarks such as Thor's Hammer (bottom left picture on the above collage), the double bridge, etc.  It was rewarding to note that all of our exercise has been paying off.  Burke carried Daphne with no problems and I didn't even feel tired after our hike.

The babies played so good together and kept us laughing the whole time.  They were both great sports and endured their backpack caravaning patiently.  Here is a video at the Bryce Point lookout enjoying the views and the babies.

The red rock vistas were quite spectacular as was the company.  Thanks for the fun trip Isons!