Boulder, Utah
(435) 691-1241
(307) 733-4261
|
|
|
|||
|
Boulder, Utah |
Jackson Hole, Wyoming | |||
|
(435) 691-1241 |
(307) 733-4261 |
|||
 |
About Earth Tours | Guides | Learn a little something along the way |  |
|||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
||||||
|
TOURS Southern
Utah |
6-day
Road Trip Exploring Zion, Bryce, Grand Staircase-Escalante, and Capitol
Reef "The plateaus commonly rise above one another in precipitous steps, in some places hundreds and even thousands of feet. The facade of cliffs separating the terrace levels appear as majestic walls, murals, pilasters, and columns forming the most dramatic features in a dramatic landscape... The whole is a grand masterpiece of erosion and color." - C. Gregory Crampton, 1964  On our 6-day scenic tour, we will visit Zion, Bryce, and Capitol Reef
National Parks and the new Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. Zion
takes the beauty of the Navajo Sandstone to new heights, its mesas and domes
tower 2000 feet above the gorge of the emerald Virgin River. Bryce embodies
the vivid colors of the sunset frozen in soft rocks crumbling away with such
beauty that it seems a crime to call it badlands topography. Coupled with
the beauty of the Escalante Canyons and Capitol Reef (see appropriate
sections), this tour is a smorgasbord of some of the finest scenery in
southern Utah. Day 1 – Cedar City or St. George to Zion National Park Zion National Park is Utah’s first national park for good reason – it is awesomely beautiful!! The centerpiece of Zion is the Navajo Sandstone, ancient sand dunes turned to stone. Once like the Sahara Desert or scenes from Dune, thousands of feet of windblown sand have been petrified into Utah’s premier slickrock sandstone. Its unique landforms have colors, textures and patterns that delight the eyes and the spirit. In Zion, the Virgin River has carved a narrow 2000-foot deep gorge through Navajo monoliths, with shaded alcoves holding delightful forests and springs that contrast with the desert biomes. We will stay at the historic Zion National Park Lodge, amidst a lovely broad canyon in the center of Zion’s spectacular scenery. Nearly tame herds of mule deer grace the meadows and canyon wrens echo off the rock walls. Hikes to places like the Emerald Pools, Weeping Wall, and the Narrows will put you in touch with the beauty of the place.  Day 2- Zion to Bryce
National Park Bryce Canyon National Park is the definition of color in rock – its pink cliffs are a wild jumble of shapes and forms called “hoodoos”, created by erosion literally melting away soft sedimentary lakebeds. At the rim of a plateau, the “pink cliffs” of Bryce provide a balcony seat for looking over the Grand Staircase of sedimentary rock layers - pink, gray, white, chocolate, and vermilion - that drop down to the rim of the Grand Canyon. Climbing to over 9000 feet in elevation, changes in plant and animal communities are tied to the most precious of desert essentials, water. Even bristlecone pines, the oldest trees on Earth, are able to survive under subalpine conditions. We will stay at Bryce Canyon National Park Lodge, another historic lodge located within Bryce Canyon National Park. Nestled in a fragrant forest of ponderosa pines, nearby vistas at Sunrise and Sunset Points are but a short walk. Hiking through the Queen’s Garden, Navajo Trail, and taking in views at Yovimpa, Rainbow, and Bryce Points will keep you spellbound  Day 3 – Bryce to Boulder - Grand Staircase-Escalante National MonumentHighway 12 between Bryce and Boulder, Utah is perhaps the most spectacularly scenic byway on Earth!! Traversing the slickrock Navajo Sandstone flanking the Escalante River, the scenery is a wonderland of weird landforms painted with Nature’s watercolors - words cannot echo the beauty. Boulder, Utah is, without a doubt, the most seductive little town in southern Utah, set in an emerald valley surrounded by blond Navajo Sandstone cliffs capped with a Carmel coating that bleeds red watercolors down the flanks of the mesas. Deer and wild turkeys love this place, as do horses. A back-of-beyond place that received its mail by mule train until the 1930’s, Boulder is set smack dab in the middle of the most spectacular and wild scenery of the Colorado Plateau. We will spend three nights at the Boulder Mountain Lodge, an oasis of civilization in the middle of the red rock desert. A nearby marsh provides great birding opportunities from your balcony seat. With luck, coyotes will sing an evening serenade and the stars will light the night sky.  Day 4 – Calf
Creek - Grand Staircase - Escalante National MonumentMotoring along the “Hogback”, a narrow sandstone ridge overlooking the slickrock basins of Calf Creek and Boulder Creek, is one of the most thrilling drives on Earth. We will hike up Calf Creek, a lush, spring-fed stream lined by riparian forests and loaded with trout and beaver, in contrast to the surrounding redrock desert. Lower Calf Creek Falls plunges into a huge green whirlpool surrounded by an amphitheater lined with maidenhair fern. A perfect place for a picnic lunch, the mists feel delightfully cool and refreshing. Prehistoric people, the Anasazi and Fremont Indians, also loved this place as illustrated by petroglyphs and stone structures. Desert wildflowers are beautiful in spring and fall colors are spectacular. Another short hike onto a terrace overlooking the Escalante River will allow us to examine more rock art. A museum and expert archeologist at Anasazi State Park in Boulder will help to answer questions about prehistoric people who lived off the bountiful land here.  Day 5 – Capitol Reef National Park and the Burr TrailDriving east along the Burr Trail, we will be dazzled by the colorful rocks carved by Escalante tributaries and see the beautiful Circle Cliff the merge with Waterpocket Fold. At the foot of Boulder Mountain, Waterpocket Fold is an enormous step-like wrinkle where sedimentary rocks have been tilted up on end. Uplifted along this fold, Capitol Reef is the nearly impassable wall of Navajo Sandstone that stretches for more than one hundred miles, the centerpiece of the park. After hiking to a overlook to take in spectacular vistas in the morning light, we return to where the Burr Trail switchbacks down Waterpocket fold, then follow the Strike Valley northward to the Fremont River, crossing several streams that have carved passages across the “reef”. Along the Fremont River, the old Mormon settlement of Fruita still has lovely fruit orchards that will be filled with spring blossoms. Hikes to look at Fremont petroglyphs and a pioneer rock register make this desert beauty come alive. We finish our day with a drive over Boulder Mountain, climbing to over 9000’ where views over the Colorado Plateau are unrivaled, then dropping back to lovely Boulder.  Day 6 – Boulder to Cedar City or St. George via Cedar Breaks National
MonumentWe will return to either St. George or Cedar City airport, enjoying the scenery of the Escalante drainage, the Grand Staircase, and Bryce. Time permitting; we will stop at Cedar Breaks, another national monument with wildly colored hoodoos like those at Bryce. Climbing to nearly 10,000’ elevation, we will observe once again the changes in vegetation and wildlife as we climb from desert to subalpine zones.  MealsI will provide my world famous gourmet lunches and a variety of non-alcoholic beverages. Breakfast and dinner will be available at the hotel restaurants, all very good with a variety of entrees – steak, seafood, and vegetarian. Guests will be responsible for their own dinner and bar bills, so you can enjoy the complete menus. Alcoholic Beverages and Mormon Customs Until recently in most of Utah, wine and spirits were not available by the drink or even at restaurants. Wine is now available at Bryce, Zion, and Boulder restaurants. We will stop at a Utah State Liquor Store in either St. George or Cedar City for you to provision yourselves. A modest selection of wines tops out with a couple $40+ vintages. More limited State Liquor Stores are available near Bryce and in Escalante. If you have any special medicinal needs, make necessary arrangements before you reach the hinterland. Price Please call for a quote. The price will depend upon the number of guests on the tour and upon the hotel rates (you will have the option of selecting from a variety of hotels where you might stay depending upon availability). In order to procure lodging at hotels located within the national parks, it is a good idea to book in early October in order to get reservations on their limited number of rooms (this is most important at the Grand Canyon where no other nearby options exist). Price will include lodging, guides, transportation (originating at St. George or Cedar City; extra fee for picking you up in Las Vegas or Salt Lake City), an excellent lending library of books and maps, lunches, snacks and non-alcoholic beverages. Does not include cost of breakfasts (except at B&Bs), dinners, alcoholic beverages, gratuities, or sales tax. |
||||||||