Travelling Tales - Part 12

After saying goodbye to the girls our next port of call was Utah.  So after a visit to the local dealership in Vegas we headed for Zion National Park, we had been there in 1992 and were more than happy to go back.  It was a pleasant riding day, lots of lovely scenery after the desert.



We stayed at the Zion Park Inn in Springdale, mountains in the backyard, wonderful views from the room.  This hotel has an amazing restaurant and we had one of the best meals of the trip.  The temperature was much more manageable here too.





Due to traffic problems in the park you can no longer do a self drive tour of the main park and have to go via a shuttle which wasn't any good to us, so we just chose to ride the scenic loop

















As you can see we ran into some 'weather' - waterproofs for the first time in weeks, but we pressed on to take in the Cedar Break National Monument - we certainly got our monies worth out of our Parks Pass. Our next stop was the Utah State HOG Rally in Panguitch, as the weather wasn't very kind we decided to skip registration and head for our hotel which unfortunately was 20 miles away - Ruby's Inn in Bryce Canyon. Only place we could get booked into plus we had stayed there before so knew it was good. Quiet dinner and a good nights sleep.

Friday 25 June - Back to Panguitch to register, we were made to feel very welcome, in fact they were worried when we hadn't turned up yesterday, we were treated like visiting royalty!



Peter won a prize draw - Harley Cap, had his bike washed by the local girls basketball team (well not all of them), booked some concert tickets - Charlie Daniels Band.  We found that this rally was even stranger than the Arizona one, there was no central meeting place,  no entertainment unless you were going to the concert.  It was more a meet up for large groups of friends. We skipped the Poker Run as it covered the same ground as we had ridden the day before.  After a wander round, chatted to a few people and basically killed time until dinner and the concert - which was very good. Long, dark, cold ride back to the hotel.

Saturday 26 June - exploring Bryce Canyon - again.  It was as lovely as we remembered











Thunder, rain, you name it, we got wet, but luckily not as wet as we could have been.  By 2:15 it had cleared so we headed back to Panguitch for the awards, games and dinner - the local Fire Brigade laid on a BBQ - the only thing we concluded about US rallies is that you get fed at some point over the weekend!