Day 11 - Capitol Reef National Park and lots of driving

Date: Monday, June 20, 2016
Posted from: Virgin, UT - Zion River Resort RV Park

Miles driven: 286

Total trip miles: 2,222

Total national parks visited: 6

Matt and I looked at the map and agreed to skip Capitol Reef National Park. It was quite a bit of extra driving, and there didn't seem to be any compelling reason to go. My book described it as looking a lot like its southern Utah national park neighbors, but less busy. Uh okay. 

So this morning we started out on a day that promised to be mostly interstate travel. I70 to I15. We made it a whole 24 miles on I70 before Matt said, let's get off the interstate. I have to admit that I agreed. It was really boring and we seemed to be missing beautiful things we could see off in the distance. So we got off on highway 24 and headed south...to Capitol Reef NP. The kids cheered. They did not want to miss it. Matt had a smile on his face. We made the right choice. Interstates are just not our thing (unless we are trying to get through Nebraska...sorry Nebraska).

Besides, we would not have enjoyed paying $2.70 for diesel at this gas station built into the side of a rock. 

As you walk back to the bathroom it gets colder as you are deeper in the rock. And we are not talking fake Disney rock. You gotta love the back roads! 

The road to the park was a bit rough...and by a bit I mean it was the roughest road we had been on yet. We felt like we were off roading with a 30ft trailer. You know you are on a good road when your seat belt locks up and won't really unlock. 

But the scenery was worth it. (This picture was a survivor. Most were blurry due to bumps.) It was much better than this most of the drive. 

We finally made it the the park. (Notice Matt's pained expression. No actually it was just the sun. He laughed through all of the bumps, steep grades, and mountain passes.)

I have to say that we were all really glad we did not bypass this park. It was actually very different from some of the other parks we had been to so far. At the center of the park is an old Mormon settlement. the barns, school, blacksmith shop and other building are still standing and they have kept some in working order. Not to mention the cliffs and other beautiful rock formations.

The color doesn't show up very well in my phone pictures, but the rock was a beautiful bright orange.

You can see the layers of the canyon.

This park had the best picnic spot. It was peaceful and full of wildlife. It was cool with a nice breeze.

The settlement town is called Fruita. The settlers planted over 2000 fruit trees and if any of the fruit is in season while you are there you can pick it and eat it for free.  The only thing in season while we were there was mulberry bushes. But the kids were excited because we were going to miss mulberry season on the farm this year, so it worked out great.

We found the spooky old tree from the Bernstein Bear book. It was actually a cottonwood that has significantly outlived its expected lifespan, but it was really impressive.

This little house is magical. Within this little house is homemade pie and homemade ice cream. Again, this is one of the unique things about this park. They freeze the fruit and make pies with it throughout the year to sell to visitors.

The barn is off in the distance.

Our hands after picking mulberries.

We left Capitol Reef and drove the rest of the way to our Zion campground. We went up and around to take the interstate because our camper and truck is too big to pull through the tunnel in Zion. Our height and width are fine, but we are too long. You must be under 50 ft total. We are closer to 54...darn crew cab.

We finally arrived at our campground. It was only 107 degrees outside, so we made dinner and finally it was time  to eat pie and ice cream.

It must have been good.