Monday afternoon, August 31:
After lunch, I drove about five miles to the north, into an area
of the park called Water Canyon. It is actually outside the entrance
to the park, so one can visit this area without paying admission.
This area is home to Mossy Cave and a small waterfall. The trail is
only about 0.9 miles, each way, with an elevation change of 300
feet.
The higher elevations of this canyon have the texture
typical of Bryce Canyon and its hoodoos, while the lower section is
without hoodoos.
As you can see, a nice stream runs through
this canyon.
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Mossy Cave is not a cavern, but only a "shelter
cave." In the winter, it is supposedly filled with giant
icicles. On the last day in August, there was no ice
left.
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Here's the view from inside the cave, looking
out:
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Here's a view of the stream meandering through the
canyon:
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This is the small waterfall, which flows from May
to October.
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The Mossy Cave trail here is not a loop, so
one returns on the same path. Here's a view on the way
out:
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The National Park Service sometimes does a lot to
make areas accessible to visitors. They lay out trails, and then
preparation can be as simple as making sure that it's fairly well
marked and clear of large obstructions, to more complex preparations,
such as adding fill to create a safer, more manageable slope, or in
this case adding a pedestrian footbridge. However, the Park Service
tries to minimize the environmental impact of the changes they make.
For example, if they add walls, they may assemble them from local
rocks, or make them from bricks that are a color close to the
surrounding terrain. Here, the bridge is painted a dark brown shade
that blends well.
Monday late afternoon, August 31:
After
leaving Mossy Cave and returning to the main part of the park, I paid
short visits to three overlooks. In addition to trails, parks may
have overlooks where a visitor can see beautiful scenery without
leaving his car, or at least without having to walk more than a few
feet from it.
I previously mentioned Sunrise Point and Sunset
Point as the start and end points of my three mile hike that morning
on the Queens Garden Trail and Navajo Trail. Those were overlooks
into Bryce Canyon itself, also referred to as “the Bryce
Amphitheater.”
I returned to that general area, and
visited the two other overlooks into the Bryce Amphitheater. If you
can imagine the Amphitheater as a clock, then Sunrise Point is at the
10 o’clock position, Sunset Point is at the 9 o’clock
position, Inspiration Point is at the 8 o’clock position, and
Bryce Point is at the 6 o’clock position.
So here’s
the view from Inspiration Point, about ½ mile to the south of
Sunset Point.
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Here’s the view from Bryce Point, about a
mile to the southeast of Inspiration Point.
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I also took a zoom shot from Bryce Point. I don’t
have a superzoom camera; rather, it’s only a 4x-zoom, from 25mm
equivalent (a wide angle) to 100mm (twice the normal view). The air
quality in that area of the country is excellent, so on a clear day
one can see 150 miles! However, as I mentioned, there had been a
problem with forest fires, so the sky did appear hazy at
times.
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The third overlook that I visited that late
afternoon was Paria View. It’s about a mile southwest of Bryce
Point, and it’s not on the rim of the Bryce Amphitheater, but
rather has a view toward the park’s “Pink Cliffs.”
However, between the haze and the late afternoon lighting, I don’t
think the view is as pleasing as those of the overlooks into the
Bryce Amphitheater.
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I returned to my campsite for dinner. My camera battery had
run down, so I plugged it into the charger and plugged the charger
into an outlet at the campground restroom nearest to my
campsite.
There was an evening program at the Lodge. The Parks
frequently have programs run by rangers. This may include some hikes,
or talks at observation points, or talks at the Visitor Center,
campsite, or a lodge. This night, the program was on endangered
animals. This talk was given by a volunteer, rather than a Park
ranger. She mentioned a number of species that were close to
extinction that have rebounded to some extent. One species is the
Utah prairie dogs, a colony of which lives in Bryce Canyon National
Park. Unfortunately, I didn't see any of them. She claimed that they
can run as fast as 40 mph, which is why the speed limit in some areas
of the park is 35 mph. I don't really believe that: it's not unusual
for parks to have such speed limits, as roads are narrow, winding,
and drivers need to watch out for other drivers who pull over to
admire a site or an animal. Thus, I really doubt that the speed limit
was set to allow prairie dogs to run away from a car. The speaker
claimed that prairie dogs traditionally lived near the buffalo herds,
eating buffalo droppings. At Bryce Canyon, a company has a concession
to offer horse rides, and the prairie dogs have found horse droppings
to be tasty. Thus, a driver may see these prairie dogs in the road,
enjoying something left behind by a horse. She also said that if a
prairie dog dies above ground, such as being run over on a road, the
other prairie dogs will cannibalize it. She said that they don't do
that if one dies underground. She speculated that they do this so
that predators won't see the dead prairie dog and realize that there
are live ones nearby.
After the program, I returned to my
campsite and retrieved my camera battery, which had been recharged.
People are trusting enough to leave some items plugged in for a
couple of hours to recharge, such as an electric shaver, and walk
away, expecting they will be there when they return. For that matter,
people leave their tents and sleeping bags at the campsite and go
away for hours.
I watched the end of the Warehouse 13
episode from the night before, and went to sleep.
Coming up next: "Tuesday
morning's hike among ancient bristlecone pines."