The plan for today was ambitious – drive four and half hours from Canyonlands to Bryce Canyon, “experience” Bryce Canyon, then drive another two and a half hours to an undetermined campsite outside of the Grand Canyon.
We started the day off right by stopping at Wendy’s along the way and picking up a bottle of Wild Turkey 101 – anything to help us fall asleep on the ground for another two nights.
We arrived at
Bryce Canyon just in time to catch the 3:00 showing of a 22-minute movie at the
Visitor Center.
On stretches like this of the trip, those 22 minutes in a comfy theater go a long way.
After the movie, we began our drive through the park.
We initially approached Bryce Canyon with perhaps a cynical attitude, but eventually we came to appreciate the place. 
After a half hour drive that ended with a view that left us both saying “eh”, we began to wonder if vistas with 50 miles of visibility were really doing it for us anymore. We then drove to Bryce Point, which gave us the classic view of the park’s famous Bryce Amphitheater. The massive canyon was filled with “hoodoos”, spires of pink rock. Other rock formations looked like abandoned city ruins. We decided at this point that we should really give Bryce Canyon a fair shot by taking a short hike through the hoodoos. 
Sure enough, experiencing the park by foot and up close was far superior to driving from view to view – a common theme for these national parks. After making ourselves a nice dinner of Campbell’s chunky chicken noodle soup, we caught the sunset at the Amphitheater and then headed for Arizona.
The night drive from Bryce Canyon to Kaibab National Forest capped a crazy two-day stretch in Utah. Ever since the beginning of the trip, Utah was a wildcard. We weren’t sure what to expect or how we would even get to see all of the places that we wanted to. In less than two days, we saw three national parks, and while each focused almost exclusively on rock formations, the uniqueness of each park made each visit worthwhile. The trip through Utah was a whirlwind, and all of a sudden we were in a car at midnight driving to the Grand Canyon. Happy to eventually find a campsite, we set up camp in the dark (again).
-Jonah
After a half hour drive that ended with a view that left us both saying “eh”, we began to wonder if vistas with 50 miles of visibility were really doing it for us anymore. We then drove to 
Sure enough, experiencing the park by foot and up close was far superior to driving from view to view – a common theme for these national parks. After making ourselves a nice dinner of 
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