After leaving Bryce Canyon, we set ourselves the challenging target of driving 50 miles for the day, we don't want to over do it! We are heading to Escalante State Park and stop at one of the viewing points on the way. The sign tells us that this area was the last blank spot on the map. It is the last part of the US to be mapped. They refer to it as the Badlands. (Stuart is surprised as he thought the Badlands was the name that the Montreal west islanders gave to the east of the island).
The sign also tells us that this spot had ideal conditions for the dinosaurs millions of years ago (something to do with tropical plains, rivers, sand and mud), but I can't remember exactly. Anyway, it's meant to be a great spot for finding dinosaur fossils.
Escalante State park is great. We have a lovely site and the other campers are really friendly.
We have an incredibly lazy day, and just do one very short hike through the forest. You can just see the campsite at the edge of the lake when we get to the top of the hill.
The hike we are doing is through a forest which contains examples of petrified wood. A sign explained how the petrified wood was formed millions of years ago. Something to do with trees, rivers and volcanic ash (I really must pay more attention to these signs). Anyway, I think it had more to do with being afraid of dinosaurs.
Our lovely campsite has a fire pit, so we make our first attempt at cooking a meal on a camp fire. I think we can call the meal a qualified success, as we had a tasty meal at the end of the process and we didn't food poison ourselves. However, our camp fire was more of a smoke pit for most of the evening. We wouldn't be winning any Boy Scout badges for our first effort!
Flora and fauna at Escalante
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