Today I had the opportunity to go to Bryce Canyon with my daughter and her fiancé. The reason we went to Bryce? Because I had never been. I was born and raised in Southern Utah, and I have only been to a few of the National Parks in the area. I pondered on why that is today as we drove, and I think it’s because we lived here, our families were from around here, it was just home. We never had anyone coming from out of state, so we never had cause to be the tourists, although we did go and visit many cool areas around us.

Another reason I’ve never been to Bryce is because we usually went south when we went hiking and visiting other places. Some of my favorite places to go growing up were other National and State parks like Zion, Cedar Breaks, Red Cliff’s, Kolob and various places like that. We also spent a lot of time on the mountains around Cedar City, hiking the trails and camping at Church camps, checking out the snow levels, fall leaves, and walking around the lakes. It’s where I gained a love for the outdoors.

When I moved to Alaska, my in-laws wanted me to experience some of the cool things Alaska had to offer, so we visited a number of the fun touristy places. Then my family started coming to Alaska and we spent most of their time there sight-seeing what we could around the state. When my kids started doing school sports we got to go to even more new places that weren’t quite so much on the beaten trail, but interesting in their own right.

I loved the things I got to see growing up and I’m grateful there’s still more new things to see in this beautiful world we live on. My future son-in-law wants to take me to see wild horses next. My daughter is very adventurous and I’m grateful she found someone to be adventurous with, who will include me in some of the fun adventures they will go on in their lives together. Being the tourist is fun when we go a long way from home, but it can also be fun just to be a tourist right in your own backyard once in a while.