Friday October 17th, 2014
Total Miles: 174

Quick coffee and power bar, packed up camp and we were on our way.   

Just outside the camping area you can see the old cellar from Starr Ranch.  The stone house was started but never finished because the mining had dried up. 

Five miles outside of camp the gravel dissipates and turns to more hard pack.  This road overall is good but be aware there are random lose rocks and some sections of soft sand.  All doable but the back end of the bike did get squirrelly a couple of times.  This is normal but as a passenger I still always get tense. 

This road dumps out right at the Burr Trail.  What an amazing road.  The views are fantastic.  I loved the switchbacks as we gained elevation.  This route will take you through Capitol Reef National Park. 

We still hit beautiful fall colors despite being late in the season.

Galen and I were both bummed that we hit blacktop so soon.  It turns out part of the Burr Trail is blacktop which I wasn’t expecting.  The Blacktop starts just as you enter the Grand Staircase National Monument. The views are still amazing and well worth making this ride.

We stopped for lunch at the Burr Trial Grill in Boulder.  Good food and good selection of beer.  Be aware that beer is expensive anywhere in Utah.

We had pavement all the way from Boulder to Bryce Canyon.  Stopped for fuel in Escalante.  The first gas station you come to in Escalante has non blender pumps.  We motored on.

We rode up to Bryce Canyon.  $12 a person gets you a pass for 7 days.  We didn’t realize that Utah Schools were out Thursday and Friday of this week.  Bryce was a zoo of people.  We stopped at the nice new Best Western in Bryce Canyon City and they were sold out.  We pulled into Rudy’s Inn and it was a mad house.  Not our style at all.  They were also full.  We traveled back 7 miles to the town of Tropic.  We were able to get a cute cabin at the Bryce Canyon Inn for $100 which included breakfast.

We got settled in our room added a few layers and headed back to Bryce to watch the sunset. Unfortunately, it was cloudy and not as impressive as it would have been on a clear evening.  That being said it was worth being there at sunset.

We stopped to have dinner at the Bryce Canyon Lodge but there was over an hour wait.  Most of the places in Tropic to get food closed at 8:30pm so we headed back towards our cabin.  Quick stop at the little grocery store to pick up some beer and then we carried out pizza from the Pizza Palace which was walking distance from our cabin.  We enjoyed pizza and beer in our room.  I washed some of our base layers in the sink to let them dry overnight.  Overall great day.