“One day I heard someone talking about ‘sifting sand’. I liked the sound of those words and scribble in my notebook ‘old man sifts sand’ tells stories…’ and forgot about it.

Then one day I was on a beach, watching the sand trickle through my fingers and thought, what if every grain held a story. And what if someone were able to tell those stories by sifting the sand?”  –   Wikiquote

“Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out going to the mountains is going home; that wilderness is a necessity…”  ~ John Muir

I am not someone who will sleep under the stars, or in a tent, or in a rustic cabin or go anywhere near anything that creeps, slithers, buzzes, flies, sneaks, spins a web, etc.  I do absolutely love to be outside and I love to hike, as long as the hike doesn’t include me edging along some precarious cliff face. I’ve mentioned before, I’m burdened with a wicked fear of heights.

It’s the stuff movies are made of. Monument Valley. The classic western hero riding his horse along the horizon, the magnificent sandstone buttes that must be seen to be believed and Yes!  There he his, John Wayne, on a 5-year quest; The Searchers.  Yep, it’s the stuff movies are made of.

Mt. Rushmore.  After setting up camp in our 3-month rental house, in our new life in Ashland, OR, we had several weeks to call our own before we took ownership of what is now our B&B.  We took care of a few matters of business and spent time scouting out our new town.  When the time was right we packed our son’s car and drove it across country with a plan to cross off Mt. Rushmore from our must see list.

You’ve probably figured out by now that southern Oregon is home to a multitude of lakes; Lake of the Woods, Hyatt Prairie, Willow and Fish Lake are just a few of the ones we’ve explored.  But as far as mountain lakes go, Crater Lake is the granddaddy of them all.

We pay the obligatory fee at the entrance to Burney Falls State Park, park and step out of the car and it hits us – we’re in the mountains.  What is it about mountain air and the smell of pine trees?  I swear the air has healing power and for me, it always brings about a big sigh of happy.

One of the things we noticed almost immediately at Bryce Canyon National Park was the small trees growing on top of some of the hoodoos and we were pretty amazed by that.  How did the trees seemingly grow out of stone?

Bryce Canyon’s Rainbow Point.  At the risk of repeating myself when I said I was pretty sure Zion National Park was not like anything else I’ve ever seen, I think I have to take it a step further by telling you that it may in fact be Bryce Canyon National Park that takes the prize.  Don’t get me wrong, I fell in love with the sheer magnitude of Zion, but Bryce is another world.

The Tunnel.  One of the tidbits I read before coming to Zion National Park was that if you don’t do anything else, you must drive the tunnel.  I thought, “Okay, we’ll drive the tunnel” having no idea what that meant.  This tunnel is like nothing you’ve ever seen.

Rainy Days in Zion National Park. We awoke this morning to p-o-u-r-i-n-g rain so the only reasonable thing to do was roll over and go back to sleep, which we did.  It goes without saying that we got a late start to the day, but we’re here for seven days so we are in no hurry.