Day 11 of 14 on a cross country adventure across America
Leave Panguitch and head the 50 miles south along Scenic Highway 89 to Mt Carmel.
This is an easy start to the as you make good time along the free-flowing road as you have time to take in the scenery around you.

Heading East you will soon arrive in Utah’s First National Park. Open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Touted by seasoned travelers as one of the most “user friendly” national parks in the country with a rare combination of elevation, wide open and level spaces, spectacular slot canyons, great year-round temperatures, and an expansive river valley. The park attracts nearly four million visitors each year. Not only are there great views of the mountains you get to drive through one of the mountains as well as you enjoy the Mount Carmel Tunnel.
Leaving the park behind you follow the river along the Virgin River Gorge as you make your way towards La Verkin. From here the landscape seems to change as the hills and mountains move to the horizon and the land seems to flatten around you.
This continues as you join the E. Veterans Memorial Highway and start to speed up and eat up some miles as you ride through the dry barren openness as you leave Utah and enter Arizona and then soon leave to enter Nevada. The landscape looks a little greener, but it is still wide and open as you continue to head South East until you see the signs for Lake Mead and the Valley of Fire. A short break to get some refreshment and stock up on liquids and you head onto the Valley of Fire
40,000 acres of bright red Aztec sandstone outcrops nestled in grey and tan limestone, Valley of Fire State Park contains ancient, petrified trees and petroglyphs dating back more than 2,000 years.
Take time to see some of the unique stone features as you pass through, be it the Elephant Rock (WP37) or the Seven Sisters (WP34)
The next section of the day is a circuit of Lake Mead, keeping the water on your left until you cross the Hoover Dam. Take some time to view Lake Mead and the feat of engineering that is the Hoover Dam. This was built in 5 years between 1931-36 and is 726.4 feet from the foundation rock to the roadway on the crest of the dam.

Once the photographs have been taken it is just a short ride back along Greta Basin Highway to the Hoover Dam Lodge where you stop for the night.

How to ever try and explain this day. Great riding roads, geological wonders and man made feats of engineering. This is a perfect 4 star day