Oftentimes,
after pouring through guidebooks and internet reviews, I go into a trip
expecting a certain place or experience to be my favorite. More often than not,
the highlights of a trip end up being something completely unexpected – a
detour I didn’t plan on, or restaurant I never heard about. Zion ended up being
both. It was the park I looked forward to visiting most and remains the
highlight of the trip, but not for the reasons I anticipated.
After
driving through Utah’s desert for three days, entering the canyons of Zion
National Park is a very welcome site. It truly is an oasis – the Virgin River
is never far away, the canyon’s steep walls are awe-inspiring, and the green
trees are an appreciated contrast after endless red rocks. Since we entered the
park pretty early in the day, and from the less crowded East entrance, we
didn’t have to deal with the park traffic jams we’d been warned about.
We
parked at the Visitor’s Center and hopped on a shuttle to our first hike of the
day – Angel’s Landing (park buses shuttle visitor’s from site to site for
free). When researching what to do in Zion, a common theme was to not miss this
hike. I read that although the path can be a little steep, the view from the
top looking down on the canyon is incredible. I was excited and still didn’t
think much of it, even when our friend became extremely nervous after looking
at pictures of the path the night before.
Angel’s
landing is a small portion of rock that juts out about a half mile into Zion
Canyon, 1400ft off the ground. The hike up to the actual landing is pretty steep
– with an intense series of switchbacks near the end named “Walter’s Wiggles.”
When we got to the top we though we might be close to the end….not the case. We
got a good look at the path for the first time and came face to face with the a
sign warning that six people had died from falling off this path in the last ten years. The hike was longer, steeper, and more treacherous than I expected, but
there was no turning back at this point.
Our
friends went on ahead, while CJ and I took the walk a little slower, stopping
to take in the views (or maybe to convince ourselves to keep going.. J). The path is solid rock, sometime coated
with a thin layer of sand, and incredibly steep. There are chains to hold onto
the entire way and the width varies from probably about 20ft to 2ft wide in
places. What doesn’t vary is the height – there was a sheer drop off to the
canyon floor on either side. CJ and I didn’t talk most of the way; we were too
busy carefully watching where we planted our feet. Slowly but surely we made it
to the to the landing. The view was well worth it. We had an uninterrupted 360
degree view of the canyon. It truly felt like you were standing on air. After a
few minutes up top, we made our way back, caught our breath, shared stories of
how scared we were, and thanked our lucky stars to be back on solid ground.
This
might have been enough for one day, but when you only have 12hrs to visit a
park as amazing as Zion, you don’t get much time to rest. So, we headed on a
short hike to the Emerald pools. There hadn’t been much rain in the weeks
before we visited, so the waterfalls weren’t very spectacular, but this was a
perfect shady spot to rest for a while.
Next,
we headed to the Narrows to do an out and back hike through down the Virgin river.
The water is ankle deep in some places, waist high in others, and the river is
surrounded by steep canyon walls on each side. This was one of my absolute
favorite parts of the trip. The water was so clear and the canyons were gigantic. The water was chilly, but not uncomfortably cold, as I’ve heard
it can be earlier in the year. We hiked for about an hour before reluctantly turning
around (we still had a 3hr drive to Las Vegas that night). We still found a
little time to go swimming in the water too! Leaving Zion was bittersweet –
this was our last park, but we ended with a bang.
No comments:
Post a Comment