Bryce Canyon National Park

The next morning we headed to Bryce Canyon National Park. 

We had planned to stay at least half the day and do a couple of short hikes, but we found out part of the main park road was buried in 60 inches of snow. We headed to the rim to do part of the Rim Trail (1.88 miles). 

Bryce was beautiful. Apparently it's not actually a canyon, but a series of amphitheaters. The structures you see below are called hoodoos. 

Some of the rim trail was so slick and steep that the kids ended up sledding (without sleds).

We hiked from Sunrise point to Sunset point to Inspiration Point, and in the other direction only partway to Fairyland Point (where it got too steep in the snow).

We did get to see Thor's Hammer - one of the most famous hoodoos.

This is the Queen's Garden trail that we were hoping to do, but Eleanor and I started down it and it was way too slick. Everyone attempting it had microspikes and poles. 

This one was the Navajo Loop - another trail we had planned on attempting. This one wasn't even open.

We only stayed at Bryce for a couple hours, and then came up with another plan for the day because we couldn't safely go into the canyon. It was so beautiful though and I'm glad we were able to see it!

You can see the rim trail was about 3 feet deep in snow throughout - that piece of wood was one of the benches.

Would we go back? Definitely. This park was so unique and cool and I would love to go into the canyon at some point. It was a very cool place!