Settled into Little Hollywood

Yeah, it's not only Little Hollywood, they claim it's "The Greatest Earth on Show."  These people down here in Kanab are shameless in their pursuit of tourist dollars.  We decided to blow right through Panguitch for a five reasons:

a)  It was insanely early when we arrived--4 pm.  Even after goofing off while gassing up the truck, it was only 4:15 when we left.  As we've noted, there is NOTHING to do in Panguitch and we might have died of terminal boredom.

b) There was a controlled burn on the Markagunt Plateau.  A third grader could tell you the smoke was going to settle overnight into Panguitch.  I'd bet the place has near zero visibility tomorrow before sunrise--the smoke will be choking!  There is practically no air movement in Panguitch unless one helluva storm front moves through.  That's why it gets colder than cold there in the winter--all the cold air settles in and has literally no place to go.  Uh, huh, we learned that from our 4.5 months nearby in 2001.  Fire smoke upwind goes straight to Panguitch!

c) We wanted to see the sunset light up the Elk Heart Cliffs.  There's a giant sculpted rampart of Navajo Sandstone draped gloriously along the east side of Hwy 89 between roughly Orderville and a zone south of the Mt. Carmel Junction.  This cliff line is spectacular in almost any light.  However, it truly comes alive with the low angle western light.  WOW.  We timed our arrival perfectly and, yea verily, it was one of them "Greatest Earth on Show" episodes they brag about in Kay-Nab.

d) Reason # four is that it was nearing "deer time."  Deer Time ain't no picnic--that's when Bambi & Friends leap out of the forest and commit suicide on the front of cars and trucks.  Highway 89 between Kanab & Panguitch is a graveyard of road kill deer.  So, we boogied as fast as we could for Kanab to get ahead of prime Deer Time.  We have on other deer gauntlet to run tomorrow up on the Kaibab Monocline.  That ridge is FAMOUS for deer collisions.  Many deer spend their whole lives dreaming of dying on the front of a Peterbilt.  It oughta be interesting.

e) The final reason is that we wanted to gain an hour on our drive time tomorrow.  it's now only going to be five hours instead of six.  With a little luck and a very short pit stop in Page, we might be able to get to the VOC Post Office before they close at noon.  We're hoping to leave at 6 am--any later and there's no chance of making the noon deadline.  Who knows whether we will arise and leave that early?

When we arrived in Kay-Nab a little before 5:30 pm, we skimmed the appearance of the motels on the "northbound" side of town.  We spotted one that said "All rooms $49" but a homey looking one toward the edge of town had caught my eye.  Susun is the "Price Commando."  She can get a best price out of anyone.  Must be her smile and blue eyes.  Anyway, she got $39 plus $4.47 tax outta the guy for Room #7.  I will proc some pix later.  We got unpacked and settled in before 6 pm. The guy's WIFI rox and it's a nice room.  Whew, 540 miles in 10 hours for a 54 mph average including stops and so forth.  That's flying, folks--balls to the walls and all of that.  I feel real good to be here.

well, we will post other stuff later--time to relax, eat and shuffle around, fluffing our feathers and preening like two snowbirds in a Kanab motel room.