Day 3: Bryce to Zion

The funny running we experienced on the first day only got worse on the second. On the third I woke up to the smell of raw gasoline and the trouble became clear: there was a little-ish-getting bigger gas leak right under the tank. Under normal driving the drip-drip-drip wasn't enough to notice but under load, it starved the carburetors a little, and Ludwig struggled up the grades.

The fix was easy-peasy, but I knew it would involve spilling at least a(nother) pint of gas on the ground, which I didn't want to do in the campground. We drove it just outside the park to a service station. Unfortunately, then wouldn't let me spill gas on their parking lot either, nor would they let me use their shop. So some randos swapped out the offending three inches of fuel line.

Okay, enough of that. Forty-five minutes and $25 later we were back in the park, seeing the sights.

That's Bryce Canyon, and beyond that, Grand Staircase-Escalante.

It'll be so much nicer once the President and Secretary of the Interior start improving the view with the addition of some oil derricks. MAGA.

This was supposed to look like we're keeping her from running off the cliff.

That's a Bristlecone Pine (right), a very young one.

Ludwig's new record high point didn't even last 24 hours.

These ladies from Baltimore were feeding the ravens (ah, the irony). Stinkerton was having none of it; she stormed over and yelled "Don't feed wildlife!" at them until they couldn't ignore her anymore.

After hiking around the Bristlecones we made our way to Zion. 

That hole below and to the right of center is one of the windows in the 1.1-mile Zion-Mt. Carmel Tunnel. We won't bore you with the video we took driving through it. I mean, the tunnel is awesome but the video isn't.

The contrast between Bryce Canyon and Zion was almost disorienting. We'd awoken to temps in the teens and had our boots and coats on all day, hiking in the snow. Once we got through the tunnel, it was warm and a little further down the valley there were palm trees.  
The moon rose right in the middle of that rock cradle up there.

miles 39128.5-39254.5