[Lesherp]

Last year was our first big trip in the TM and with the suggestions we got from fellow members here it was fantastic. It took us 3 leisurely days traveling to Utah from Oregon. We spent 6 weeks visiting Zion, Bryce, Capitol Reef, Arches, and both parks in Canyonlands.

We are now making plans for our big 2013 trip. It will be back to the Bryce area as weather cut our stay there a little short last year and we loved the area. We wanted to hike more of Bryce and Red Canyon. We plan on spending a week there. From there we will spend a couple of days in Zion. What a magical place. We hiked almost every trail there last year, and yes I did hike to the top of Angles Landing. We will top off batteries and resupply before traveling to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon for 5 days. The next jump will be to Mesa Verdi. We were only able to get 3 days there, I hope it will be enough time. We plan on spending a few days in Black Canyon of the Gunnison NP on the way up to the Rocky Mountain NP area. We have not determined where we are going to camp there yet. I have read OneMoBear's post about Peaceful Valley and Camp Dick and are probably going to stay at one of them unless we get additional information. Any suggestions would be most welcome. From there it will be a rather long travel day (I like to keep them no more than 6 or 7 hours) to Rapid City to visit with family and enjoy the Black Hills. A week of family should be enough and on to Yellowstone. This is one of our favorite places and an old standby for us when returning home from the Dakotas. First night reservations in Yellowstone and then over to Lizards Tail in the Tetons where we generally stay when in that area. If you are ever going to Yellowstone you should consider it as a option! Larger more private camp sites than Yellowstone. We were able to find a site that the TM would fit on right on the lake last time we were there. It is just minutes from both park entrances. From there we are planning on going to another old favorite of ours; Hosmer Lake in the high Cascades in eastern Oregon. Not sure the length of stays at the last 2 as we were about ready for home after 6 weeks last year

We are not heading out until middle of May but are getting excite already! Any suggestions about these areas, particularly Rocky Mountain NP would be appreciated.