Canyons

Corrie and I returned to Alaska a couple of weeks ago and I am finally catching up on the photos from the trip.

Leaving Sequoia we drove south around the Sierra Nevada and headed east across the desert to Albuquerque. As we drove towards Vegas the temperature outside climbed to 114° and I decided this post should be dedicated to Willis Carrier. I'd also like to thank Corrie for thinking ahead enough to reserve a hotel room with a air conditioning because it was still 108° at 10pm. Camoing in that is a quick recipe for baked (and grumpy) Alaskan.

We started our Zion visit with a trip up the less popular Kolob canyon. It's a short scenic drive with a nice hike at the top and a couple more along the way that would have nice in cooler weather. 

The view from the top. 

We also drove the portion of the main road that is open to traffic in the summer. The road is nice, but I'd really like to go back and do more hiking during a colder season.

We also met a couple from Argentina in Zion who were driving to Alaska. We didn't spend much time talking with them there, but we invited them to stay with us in Anchorage which eventually made it the highlight of our visit to Zion. More on that in a future post.

Corrie and I have both been to Grand Canyon's south rim several times and decided to see the north rim this trip.

The north rim is more than a thousand feet higher than the south rim and gets enough snow to close the road during the winter. In the summer it's both cooler less crowded than the south rim. 

It was still hot, but the cooler weather made hiking more enjoyable and we did several of the trails along with Eva, Sam, and Simon. 

Glen Canyon Dam  from the visitors center. This was probably the most interesting (to me) visitor center we stopped at. Sometimes Corrie says traveling with me is like going on an infrastructure tour. 

I know it's really southern CO, but the sunset at Mesa Verde really felt like being back in NM. Sunsets in the southwest feel short and intense compared to Alaska.

Simon and Sam were troopers on the ranger guided tours. The brochure said you couldn't do all three ranger guided tours in one day... I guess they didn't account for Corrie and Eva's optimization.  

Corrie was also a happy explorer. 

I was most impressed with the longevity of the construction. It makes me wonder about what will be left of the things we build in a thousand years.

By the end of the day Simon was pretty worn out, but then he started a game of "you can't put my hat back on" and I realized that almost catching him could keep him running all the way back to the car.