Cedar Breaks National Monument, Utah

Sunday, October 15

My Dad's 88th birthday today. Happy Birthday Dad.

Dad and his wonderful care-giver Larny. Picture taken last spring.

Coldest morning yet, 23F, as the sun starts to rise. We are snug in our house with our Big Buddy Heater. Last night I got woken up around 11:30 pm to a bunch of kids deciding to have a party and campfire right behind our campsite. There were lots of booming from the stereo, girls madly giggling, but other than that they seemed well behaved. It was only 34F out so they only lasted 45 minutes before heading out in 2 vehicles. I can never understand why people get so close to other campers when the rest of the campsite is empty. Ray went over this morning but the site was clean other than a few pieces of firewood (thank you I'll take those), an empty pop bottle and a plastic bag.

We still have a family kiddy corner to us and then these kids came right behind us??? Oh well, the kids from the family are nice and friendly and like Freya so no problem. They also have a dog that wants to play with Freya so everyone is happy.

Today the plan is to take a drive into Zion National Park's, Kolab Canyon. It will be cold this morning, but Ray want's to take sunrise pictures so I guess I better get dressed (warmly) and get going. Out the door by 8:15 at a balmy 26F and off we went. The drive from here is only 1/2 an hour. Once into the park there is only a short 5 mile paved road that takes you through some canyons up to the Overlook. Unfortunately, the sun wasn't shining in the canyons yet so we decided to turn around and see the Cedar Breaks National Monument instead. Ray will go back at dinner time for some shots of Kolab Canyons as it's so close by.

We took I-15 back to Cedar City and then up Hwy 14 to Cedar Breaks National Monument. Wow what a windy, twisty road up the mountain. Six years ago on our first visit to the USA for the winter, this was one of the places we visited.  Now we find we missed three of the other viewpoints as we only stopped at the main one. We see many more things now that we have the Benchmark Road Atlas for most of the states we travel through. It really shows all the the attractions in the area.

Getting down here 3 weeks earlier than last time, there is far more fall colours. Gorgeous. Here are some pictures of the journey up the highway.

Noticed the top of this mountain sloughing off. The texture looked cool so Ray took another picture for a close-up.

See the tailings to the right.

The grey striations are vertical and the pink layer below the striations are horizontal.

Our first glimpse of Pink Cliffs not part of the actual monument.

The first bunch of pictures are from the Visitor's Centre and the viewpoint called Point Supreme. This is the only viewpoint we saw 6 years ago. (In the days when we did not have a benchmark atlas, a flip phone and I was not the "google Queen" checking everything out first!)

Panoramic showing the whole length of the north side of the monument.

These cliffs and hoodoos are as spectacular as the Bryce Canyon Amphitheatre, we think, as you seem to get a little closer to them.

Next up was Sunset Viewpoint.

The amazing colours.

Next is Alpine Viewpoint:

Getting warmer, I have shed a couple of layers! lol

And last but not least the North Viewpoint:

Back home in time for lunch, I grilled our burgers over the makeshift habachi in the firepit. Yumm. I am sure our friend Steve  is wishing he was here for one of my hamburgers. lol

After lunch we sat outside enjoying the day. A lovely campsite.