9 March

Today I woke promptly at 6 (DST) and then thought I could wait a little longer, so by 6:30 I was up and had made breakfast. By 7 I was ready, packed and CHECKED the room and was leaving.
Although it was cold, there was no snow. By the time I reached Bryce Canyon National Park, it was cold. It had snowed overnight and the entry road had just been ploughed. At the Visitors Centre, only the first few places in the park were open according to the board. I set off and found that was correct, so started to look at the places which were available.
To say it was breathtaking was an understatement. It was one of the few places where I could have just stood and looked – the hoodoos and other formations were absolutely beautiful and the snow just finished them off to perfection. I imagine in spring and summer the picture would be equally entrancing but in different ways.
I met up with a very chatty group of Americans and we were talking away about the spectacle here and seeing sights in Australia and New Zealand. I took their photo and promised it would be on the web tonight. Of course, the server I am working through in the motel is going very slowly and the pictures are going out oooonnnneeee by oooonnnneeee.
On the way back to the Visitors Centre I saw a snowplough at the closed road, so checked – yes, all the roads were now open. So I went to the far point and met up again with the German couple from the motel. At this point the wind came up and it was lightly snowing, so I took as many photos as I could (some would say too many, but I doubt I will have the chance to be back again, so I will have to relive it through memories and photos). Then it was off to Zion (the national park in Utah, not the place in Israel). Once in there I looked around, but it was a case of being “rocked out” – like Mick Jagger and Keith Williams, rocking so much had taken its toll. I was becoming blasé about things I would have raved about a week ago. After three hours I had seen as much as I could and I was off to Arizona and the Grand Canyon. However, despite the Visitors Centre being less than one hundred miles away, it was nearly a two hundred mile trip there as the road cannot go directly. I arrived after dark and ended up booking into a motel just outside the park. After unpacking and checking the computer was working through the wireless link, I copied the photos for today, got a drink for tea and then started on my usual work.
The process was marred by finding out that one of my ex-students, from Derrinallum, had passed away from leukaemia, at just 28. Her mother had also died from cancer.
I waited (and waited) for the photos to upload and went to bed.