MT CARMEL TUNNEL, RED CANYON and BRYCE CANYON NATIONAL PARK

We had a long 8 hour day, but it is good when I can get right onto the pictures, deleting and cropping. And then into the Blog!!  I appreciate my off days doing other things here at home and about town. The weather today was beautiful, buy cloudy at times which played havoc with some pictures.  I tweaked them in Picasa as much as I could. So enjoy!!
I will take you through our drive and hope that you enjoy it as much as we did. Even getting in and out of the car many times was worth it.  Good exercise!!  This first picture was between Hurricane where we live and Zion Mt. Carmel Tunnel, our first pleasure.

This is one of several windows in the tunnel that we could see as we approached the tunnel on the switchback, very curvy highway.  

Zion Mt. Carmel Tunnel, which is 1.1 miles long, was completed in 1930. The scene as we drove out the other end was awesome!  We went from this on to a second shorter tunnel.

From there we drove on through Red Canyon and a beautiful valley before reaching Bryce Canyon.
On the way we stopped at a large gift shop and did some shopping and found that the clerk was a workamper. It is always interesting to find out what the jobs consist of and how many hours.  We think that she and her husband were working more hours that we would want.  But the job sounded nice.  The RV Park was just across the highway.  We also made another stop at Subway for lunch.
Now on we go - - -

I was constantly taking pictures, but they were best if we could stop and get out of the car to take them!!  Arriving at Bryce Canyon last, but certainly the most and best!!  Yes, the elevations were high enough that we ran into snow by the road.  We drove through the park to the farthest end because the pull-off points were all on the left side of the highway.  Then we stopped at every pull-off on our way back and took pictures.

Rainbow Point was our first stop at 9115 feet elevation.

Ponderosa Point was next at 8904 feet elevation.

Then on to Agua Point at 8800 feet elevation and more snow.

The next stop was the Natural Bridge at 8627 feet elevation.  I got Gary to take his hat off for a second!!  He was afraid he would freeze.

The pine trees through the arch were beautiful.  I had wished that I could have gotten more tree line above and behind the stone mountains.  But this was the best that I could do.
There were a couple more stops, but our second camera battery ran out of juice.  So we had to finish with my phone. We forgot the small camera in the car, but this will do.  I just could not zoom. I wish that I knew how to do panorama pictures!!

Fairview Point 8819 feet elevation next.

The last stop on camera - -  While here we noticed a car with Summit County Ohio Plates, so we started a conversation with them.  His parents had owned the farm land where the Carnation Mall now stands.  It was interesting talking with them and they were interested in our lifestyle.  It appeared that they were on vacation.  I never know if it would be presumptious to ask to photograph them. So to avoid any unwarranted reaction, we did not take any. If they had been full time RVers, they would have understood and expected it.  They were fun to talk with and they enjoyed the short conversation as well.  

Last stop in Bryce Canyon.  

Hope you enjoyed the views as much as we did!!
Take care and see what we come up with to do next.