We visited Cedar Breaks National Monument in Utah. A fairly basic park, without a visitor center yet (they are building one).
It’s at 10,000 feet, so was still snowy around the end of April. It is the highest part of the Grand Staircase.
Snowy amphitheater:
Snowy meadow:
Another viewpoint:
We visited Bryce Canyon National Park in Utah:
The entrance station:
Bryce Canyon visitor center:
A map and model:
An interesting idea: donation boxes by state and country:
We drove to the far end of the park, and used an audio tour feature in the NPS app (though it didn’t work reliably, so we missed some of the snippets):
A bunch of photos of Bryce Canyon from various viewpoints:
A long trail into the canyon (we didn’t partake of it):
A balcony at the end of the trail:
The other side of the balcony:
More National Park stickers on our coach:
We passed through Red Canyon in the Dixie National Forest in Utah several times.
It has some impressive rock formations:
A couple of drive-through arches:
The Red Canyon Visitor Center (which was closed when we stopped by, but we got selfies with Smokey anyway):
Another day, driving towards the canyon again; a sign for “Scenic Byway 12, All-American Road”:
Driving back the other way at sunset:
We visited Zion National Park in Utah. A couple of times, actually. For this first visit, we drove through the park, then took shuttle buses along the Zion Canyon Scenic Drive (cars are not allowed along that road most of the year).
The road changes color as you enter the park:
Zion sign:
Interesting rock patterns:
A short tunnel:
The second tunnel is 1.1 miles long, with no lights inside, other than a few windows into the canyon:
A glimpse of the canyon out one of the windows as we pass by:
We stopped for lunch just outside the park:
Then walked to the visitor center:
Unusual to have a walk-through entrance station (in addition to the usual drive-through one):
The visitor center:
We don’t have to pay to enter each of the parks, thanks to our America the Beautiful annual pass, but we more than make up for that in buying postcards and other goodies at the park stores:
On the shuttle bus:
Hey look, more rocks:
River:
Posing rock squirrel:
We took shuttle buses back down the canyon, getting off several times:
We opted to walk along a trail between two shuttle stops:
There is a second part of Zion National Park: Kolob Canyons. We drove up there:
We enjoyed our visit to Zion, and as mentioned, we went back a second time. Stay tuned for another post about that.
We stayed at The Riverside Ranch in Hatch, Utah. (Campground Reviews listing.)
Dates:
Weather:
Noise:
Site:
Internet:
Amenities:
Here’s the review Jenn wrote on Campground Reviews:
Great home base for exploring southern Utah
We stayed here for two weeks, and it was a great base camp to see Bryce, Zion, several state parks (that were just as good as the national parks), national monuments, and scenic drives. Very quiet and scenic spot, right off the highway. We would have liked to stay in one of the riverside spots, but they don’t have sewer hookups and we can’t go that long without dumping the tanks, alas. Still, the pull-through sites in the upper part of the park had a lovely view over the valley and the pink cliffs in the distance. We had several packages delivered and the camp hosts brought them right to our site, which was very convenient. The staff were all very helpful and friendly, beginning with check-in where we were given a lot of tourism info about the area. It does get windy, but that’s been our experience everywhere in the southwest at this time of year, so we didn’t get to spend as much time outside as we would’ve liked, but that’s offset by how much exploring we got to do in the area. We’d definitely stay here again. We camped at The Riverside Ranch in a Motorhome.
The weather forecast for our stay:
And the second week:
The campground map. We stayed in the upper area, as the lower (riverside) area doesn’t have sewer hookups:
Satellite view:
They gave us a bunch of tourist info for the area:
Once we spent a night here, we could add Utah to the map on the side of our coach:
Our site:
100 PSI water pressure; a regulator is definitely required (I have mine set to 60 PSI):
Dinner outside:
Paladin looking out a window:
It was too windy to work outside most days, but I did a few times:
Setting sun:
We were visited by Jenn’s Uncle Todd; our first visitors at a campsite:
An interesting window in a coach next to us for a few days:
Let’s walk around the park, starting with the sign out front:
There’s a Mexican restaurant and country store out front, but unfortunately they were closed; not sure if just for the season, or permanently:
The Riverside Ranch also includes a motel:
Downhill to the RV park:
RVs (with a glimpse of ours):
The river (more of a stream, but still):
RVs by the river:
They have some tent sites, too:
A nice corner for religious services (this is Utah, after all):
The RV office:
Group fire pit:
Bathroom:
BBQ area and RV office:
Finally, the sign lit up at night:
Last September we visited Yellowstone National Park in a rental travel trailer, shortly after buying our coach (as our 40 foot motorhome was too big to fit in Yellowstone). I did several blog posts about our trip, but Jenn recently processed the photos she took with her big camera, a Nikon D7200. So here’s a bonus post with some really nice pics of a very special place. (The photos are also on her Flickr page.) Enjoy!
A timelapse of driving the coach 177 miles from Caliente, Nevada to Hatch, Utah.
We drove our coach 177 miles, 4.5 hours, from Caliente, Nevada to Hatch, Utah. Yay, another state!
Here’s the map, heading east:
An interesting point about this route is it isn’t the most direct route — that would be highway 14. However, as the map indicates, there is a portion with a too low clearance for our coach, plus that route is very twisty and across a mountaintop. We did drive that route in our truck later, and were very glad we didn’t try to take our coach that way. This is an important part of route planning; making sure it is feasible for our RV. The RV Life Trip Wizard really helps with this.
Anyway, on with the travel pics. Caliente is a fairly cute small town; here’s Company Row:
Turning onto 319 East:
An interesting house in Panaca, and fellow RV traveler:
A curvy highway:
The GPS mirrored on the TV, approaching the Utah border, represented by the horizontal dotted line:
Entering Utah:
Interesting rocks:
Train:
The clouds looked fake:
Utah highway:
Hey there Paladin:
Snowy mountains:
Getting on to I-15:
Where the speed limit was 80 MPH, not that we go that fast in our coach:
Paladin sleeping in his safe spot next to my chair:
We didn’t really need fuel, but were concerned that truck stops would be less common out in the wilds of Utah, so stopped at T/A to top up:
We topped up the DEF, too:
A first for us, we parked with the trucks:
And headed in to Subway for lunch:
A couple more Paladin pics:
I noticed a bunch of these interesting ramps along the freeway; presumably to let animals escape the road:
Our exit:
Cattle guard:
Curvy road:
Highway leading to snowy hills:
Snow by the side of the road:
7,920 feet summit, with more curves and steep downhill ahead:
Sharp curve and mountain vista:
Interesting rocks:
“River”:
Arriving at our next destination:
Paladin watching birds while Jenn checks in:
We are both still working as we travel the country in our motorhome, so having reliable internet access is essential.
To that end, we have six internet options: two cellular plans (AT&T and Verizon) in a cellular modem, one cell plan (T-Mobile) via a Wi-Fi hotspot device, two iPhones (AT&T), and (very recently) Starlink satellite internet.
And sometimes we connect to campground Wi-Fi, when available, though our various options are usually faster and more reliable.
Having four different networks and a variety of devices ensures that almost anywhere we are, we can connect to the internet.
Some details about the plans:
I’ll cover Starlink in a separate post later, once we’ve spent more time with it — as of this post, we’ve only had it for a few days.
This is the T-Mobile Wi-Fi hotspot; we can connect to it directly, but most of the time we go via the modem, which also connects to it:
The modem has a roof-mounted antenna (the white fin in the following picture), which we got from Mobile Must Have, and installed by NIRVC; a Poynting 7-in-1 Roof Antenna. It contains 4 cell antennas, 2 WiFi antennas, and a GPS antenna:
Zoomed out a bit:
The antenna connects to the Pepwave MAX Transit modem (also from MMH), which contains the AT&T and Verizon SIMs (and can support two more). NIRVC mounted it in a cupboard above our entry door:
See a later post about some further modifications to this cupboard.
We visited Great Basin National Park in Nevada, and did a Lehman Caves tour.
The road to the park:
Wheeler Peak:
Great Basin National Park entrance:
The visitor center:
We had a picnic lunch behind the visitor center:
Lehman Caves diagram:
Lehman Caves 3D model:
Info sign:
Our ranger guide at the cave entrance. Actually, it’s the exit; they are still doing a COVID-era abbreviated tour, in and out the exit tunnel, a one hour tour instead of 1.5 hours:
The tunnel, heading down into the caves:
A bunch of pictures within the caves:
