Visiting NV, AZ, and UT this month
At the end of next week I'm headed out for a RV trip with my husband, 5 year old daughter, and six nieces & nephews ages 13-25. We did a similar (but slightly longer) trip with my parents in 2016, which inspired us to propose this trip with our awesome niecephews.
I'm looking forward to exploring these areas more, which are really very unfamiliar to me. When I turn on my iNaturalist eyes, I'm basically looking for things that are reproducing (flowers/fruits/mushrooms), moving (animals), or dead (easy to photograph!). I almost always use my iPhone 6S (with 10-15x macro if needed), but sometimes my husband will also have a camera with some longer lenses. I tend to focus on plants (like documenting everything I see blooming, ideally) and opportunistically observe other things as well.
We have a pretty tight schedule, but if anyone happens to be in these areas and it worked out to meet up, that would be fun. Also willing to train our 9 pairs of (novice) eyes on any taxa of special interest.
June 15- arrive in Las Vegas.
16- Neicephews arrive, pick up RV, camp at Valley of Fire SP.
17- Drive to Grand Canyon (North Rim). Stay at North Rim campground.
18- Explore North Rim.
19- Drive to Antelope Canyon & go on a tour. Stay in Page.
20- Drive to Zion NP (stop at Toadstool Hoodoos?). Stay in Zion NP/Springdale.
21- Explore Zion (hike The Narrows)
22- Explore Zion, drive back to Valley of Fire SP.
23- Leave early. Niecephews fly out, return RVs.
24- We depart Las Vegas early in the morning.
Tagging some folks who have made observations in/near the places we're going in case you have tips or are local:
Valley of Fire State Park: @lonnyholmes @tiwane @damontighe @jpalladini
North Rim: @lagoondon @isaac_krone @bosqueaaron @rlawrenz and @mapduck
Page, AZ area: @philippwickey @codyhough @abr @drjakuna
Zion National Park: I guess I don't need so many tips here since we were there 2 years ago, but here's what I saw there last time and let me know if there are other things I should keep an eye out for! @sea-kangaroo @thesunisbig @natureali @ryancooke @asemerdj @jay
Suggestions welcome!