We had a fast and quiet ride on RT 89 to Bryce Canyon.
Bryce Canyon National Park has one access road, so the exploration is an out-and-back of its 18 miles, with some scenic pull-offs along the way. There were pretty vistas, but they were difficult to capture with a camera because they were so vast and we were looking down on them.
Bryce Canyon National Park has one access road, so the exploration is an out-and-back of its 18 miles, with some scenic pull-offs along the way. There were pretty vistas, but they were difficult to capture with a camera because they were so vast and we were looking down on them.
We used the Butler motorcycle map [which is AMAZING and highly recommended] that we acquired in SLC to plot our route.
The road from Bryce Canyon towards Capital Reef passes through Grand Staircase/Escalante National Monument, which, as it turns out, provides an experience that Naomi and I both though far exceeded Bryce Canyon. The geological features are similarly stunning, but in this case we were driving through and along them, instead of on their upper rim.
After seeing boatloads of Harleys for days and days (probably going to or from the big rally in Sturgis, SD), we finally start passing some bikes like ours. The big BMW and KTM Adventure bikes are perfect for the kind of riding Utah serves up. Miles of nice gravel and dirt roads, with stretches of fast highway in between.
We watched a thunderstorm approaching, checked the radar since we happened to have cell service at that moment, and decided to put on our rain gear, even though we expected the storm to be brief. Good thing we did suit up, because within minutes we were getting pelted with grape-sized hailstones. Thankful for our helmets, and road armor, we pulled off the road and did our best to curl into balls to cover our comparatively less-protected thighs and hands. In the three minutes we were parked there, torrents of water appeared on the cliffs alongside the road, flooding the ditch on the side of the road.
The road from Bryce Canyon towards Capital Reef passes through Grand Staircase/Escalante National Monument, which, as it turns out, provides an experience that Naomi and I both though far exceeded Bryce Canyon. The geological features are similarly stunning, but in this case we were driving through and along them, instead of on their upper rim.
After seeing boatloads of Harleys for days and days (probably going to or from the big rally in Sturgis, SD), we finally start passing some bikes like ours. The big BMW and KTM Adventure bikes are perfect for the kind of riding Utah serves up. Miles of nice gravel and dirt roads, with stretches of fast highway in between.
We watched a thunderstorm approaching, checked the radar since we happened to have cell service at that moment, and decided to put on our rain gear, even though we expected the storm to be brief. Good thing we did suit up, because within minutes we were getting pelted with grape-sized hailstones. Thankful for our helmets, and road armor, we pulled off the road and did our best to curl into balls to cover our comparatively less-protected thighs and hands. In the three minutes we were parked there, torrents of water appeared on the cliffs alongside the road, flooding the ditch on the side of the road.
Hailstorm over, we pressed on through the gorgeous grand staircase. Naomi noticed that the herbal aroma of the sagebrush was particularly pronounced after the bushes had been pulverized by hailstones. We came across a place called Kiva Coffeehouse, a coffee shop carved out of the top of a red rock cliff. All we could see from the road was a red-rock parking lot. The shop was an adobe done with panoramic windows set into log frames, looking out over the canyons.
We decided to make camp at the bottom of the canyon several hundred feet below Kiva and alongside a creek at an honor system campground. We were scouting out a site, and half the campground was on the other side of the now flooded creek bed. With no bridge across, and still in our rain gear anyway, we crossed the road which was now covered with a foot of water and a bed of algae. Mike made it most of the way across before both wheels of his bike started sliding on the slick creek bottom, and his "Oh God!" prompted a near instantaneous fall from Naomi who preventatively slammed on her brakes. Between the two of us and a Good Samaritan, we got the bike back up from its swim and walked it across the rest of the creek. With more storms on the way, which could have left us stranded on that half of the campground, we opted to turn around and picked a site in the nook of a red rock cliff.
We decided to make camp at the bottom of the canyon several hundred feet below Kiva and alongside a creek at an honor system campground. We were scouting out a site, and half the campground was on the other side of the now flooded creek bed. With no bridge across, and still in our rain gear anyway, we crossed the road which was now covered with a foot of water and a bed of algae. Mike made it most of the way across before both wheels of his bike started sliding on the slick creek bottom, and his "Oh God!" prompted a near instantaneous fall from Naomi who preventatively slammed on her brakes. Between the two of us and a Good Samaritan, we got the bike back up from its swim and walked it across the rest of the creek. With more storms on the way, which could have left us stranded on that half of the campground, we opted to turn around and picked a site in the nook of a red rock cliff.