La Vie Bohème: The American Dream Trip - The Bryce Canyon Hoodoos and stargazing

From the activity filled days in Lake Powell, we made our way to Bryce Canyon which was about a two and a half hour drive through some pretty cool landscape. From the red rocks and deserts of Arizona, to the slightly greener and woody scenes of higher elevation in Utah. None of them disappointed. If its one thing about roadtrips in the States, is that the highways seem to go on for ever and ever! Its lucky our friend Afiz and my sister Amirah hooked us up with some sick Spotify beats to help the time pass. We also had four very competent drivers to rotate around so there was no stress about having to take on long journeys.

This leg of the trip was one of my most anticipated ones as I had heard a lot how underrated this canyon was as compared to the more well-known ones. As with Lake Powell, we had planned to camp out in Bryce as well. I really wanted to camp in the National Park but reservations for campsites usually sell out 6 months prior (reservations open around April time as usually sell out like hot cakes!). There are also allocated walk-in campsites for a first-come-first-serve basis so we decided to chance out on them. Luckily for us, we were told it wasnt really peak camping season so we managed to get a really good spot.

By this point we had already mastered the art of putting up our tent so it didnt take us long to get set up. Our surroundings were lush, tall pine trees and the air had a slight breeze to it. Its worth to note early on that Bryce Canyon is situated a little higher at an elevation of roughly 8100ft. We freaked out slightly when we read a sign that said "Caution, Utah is bear country. Please keep all food inside containers." Thankfully though, we did not have a bear encounter!

The national parks in the US were really well looked after. In general, all of them would have a visitors centre where the park rangers are really helpful and there's loads of info on stuff to do at the park. All the campsites are equipped with designated tent areas, a picnic table and also a fire grill. The toilets and showers were really basic - but very well kept. The whole time we were camping, I just felt...wow. I cant believe I'm this lucky to enjoy nature like this. I'm never going to take her for granted again!"

Upon finish setting up, we had a bite to eat on the go and headed straight to one of the trails. We initially started the scenic rim trail which gave us breathtaking views of the canyon's depth and it famous distinctive Hoodoos. The Hoodoos are basically pillars of rock that have been carved out by the process of erosion and in Bryce's case - water, ice and gravity. Then we hiked the Queen's trail and the Navajo loop which took us down into the canyon, among these gigantic structures. It was only then that we could really put to scale how big these hoodoos actually were. Some of them towered over us and it actually felt like we were on the set of a Mad Max movie!

Do you see those tiny people as compared to the backdrop of the hoodoos!

And then there's us!

One of the things that Bryce is known for are for its darkest nights. Being far from the light pollutions of civilization, I read that we would be able to see 7500 stars on a moonless night. That being said, even though the moon was in full fledge action at the time of our visit, we still managed to enjoy a star sprinkled night sky. It was absolutely magical! If you ever do decide to visit, you cannot miss out on the astronomy programs by the Park Rangers. (Check out their schedules before you go because they're on certain days of the week so you dont want to miss out). I dont have any pictures from the night because our cameras werent powerful enough to deal with the darkness of the night but I'll share a picture that I got off the national parks website.

Pic credit: NPS website.

The rangers set up massive telescopes behind the visitors centre and a lot of measure were taken to minimize any light pollution to enable us to fully enjoy the experience. We got to see the moon and Saturn up close. And we were also shown how to pick out the stars and constellations and how to differentiate between stars, satellites and... airplanes LOL. Ahhh, the experience was absolutely priceless and I'm gonna be telling my grandkids one day!

One of the fondest memories of this park was how it was freakishly cold it was during the night. I remember waking up several times in the middle of the night shivering even with multiple layers of clothing and socks on. I remembered huddling up to everyone in the tent thinking they were asleep and trying to feed off their warmth. And after tossing and turning uncomfortably, I heard my baby sister say "Angah, are you awake? Its soooo cold!", And what was funny was that when I said "yeah, I'm freezing," two other voices chimed in, "I'm freezing too!". So being the eldest one in the pack, I felt really bad for my little brother and sisters so I suggested that we took a drive in the car to warm up. It must have been about 4am and it was pitch black! I was slightly spooked out if I'm gonna be honest especially when you see shining eyes in the middle of the road but heaving a massive sigh after finding out that its just a pack of deers grazing.

So we ended up on Inspiration Point - one of the highest spots in the park hoping to catch a good sunrise. Only Afiz ended up coming along with me while the other two kiddos stayed in the car due to sleepiness + cold. Boy did they miss out!