Bryce Canyon: Enjoy solitude and wonder in winter

Roughly 15 miles from Bryce Canyon, on the edge of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, is the Willis Creek Narrows, a slot canyon that is easily accessible if the weather is dry and the dirt road is passable, which is usually the case. It's less than 100 yards from the parking area to the gradual descent into the canyon.

Here again, the canyon takes on a very different look in the winter. The stream bed that runs through the canyon creates a platform of white ice that reflects the colors and contour of the canyon walls.

Not forgotten are the other attractions along the 120-mile stretch of scenic Highway 12, voted one of the top 10 Scenic Byways in the country. This would include Kodachrome Basin State Park, Escalante Petrified Forest State Park, Calf Creek Falls Recreation Area, the Escalante Canyons and the Anasazi Indian Village State Park. Then there are the towns of Tropic, Cannonville, Henrieville, Escalante and Boulder, quaint farming communities with small stores and down-home restaurants and not a single stoplight among them.

The Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, the nation's newest protected area, is far and away the largest protected area, covering roughly 1.7 million acres of sandstone cliffs of varying hues and vast areas of rugged wilderness.

The off-season rates typically cover areas that draw fewer visitors in the winter, such as Lake Powell.

And Lake Powell is another of those areas taking on a different look in the winter.

Winter is, noted Steve Ward, public relations director for ARAMARK, about the only time the lake returns perfect reflections of itself.

"It's a perfect mirror. The water is so perfectly flat that on sunny days you get a perfect reflection. Going down one of the canyons at 40 miles per hour you can't tell where the canyon walls end and the water starts," he noted.

"What we find is that people who know the lake and feel comfortable being on the water when there are so few people are those who keep coming back year after year."

It's also a popular time for photographers. The sun hangs lower on the horizon to deliver the perfect lighting.

"We call it the 'magic hour' ... and it is there for a much longer time in the off-season," added Ward.

It also a time when off-season rates can be half what they are in the peak summertime. Even making reservations in the off-season can be an advantage, said Ward. This year those making reservations for 54- and 59-foot houseboats can save up to 28 percent on summertime dates.

There are, in fact, a number of popular summer attractions that present themselves in a different light in the winter and shouldn't be ignored.

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E-mail: grass@desnews.com