We traveled across the Utah basin…ok, to put it simply, it is pretty monotonous! But, as we toddled along the sagebrush plains, I did see a band of wild horses and later some coyotes. And lots of cattle ranches and maybe 3 cornfields. We entered Highway 15 at Cedar City and made our way to Zion.
There are a lot of little towns in this part of Utah, and some have almost nothing in them. Similar to Baker Nevada. But some are pretty cute! I liked Rockville and Mt. Carmel, Orderville and Hatch. We ended up staying in Springdale right outside of Zion since the campgrounds within the park were packed. Overall, the whole NP was packed. You have to take shuttles through Zion Canyon; they run every5-7 minutes and are full all the time. Sheesh! We got up at 6am to catch one of the first shuttles and there had to be over 100 people in front of us. There are some serious hikers in this group. The rocks were beautiful and we saw quite a few mule deer along the river walk. I was not up to walking down the river, in the river, to see the narrows. Did not sound like fun. And I am really glad we didn’t do that hike because at the next stop we saw a baby California Condor make its first flight. So amazing! Even the ranger was quite excited. So we spent the afternoon going stop to stop and hiking a bit. I thought I might die on the Emerald pool walk….so damn many rock stairs up and down. My knee was really hurting by the time we were done. And there was a middle school field trip and they started out well behaved but once they got tired (the hike was NOT easy!) they were such like any other middle school students. Made me feel good about being retired! And then….in the middle of the trail… a giant tarantula just crossing the dirt. Ick! But overall the day was good.
We also made our way to Kolob Canyon, which is a separate part of Zion. It was absolutely amazing. So beautifully red stones and so tall. Where Zion has different kinds of stone- anywhere from red to pink to gray to white- Koloa was a rich red color. But apparently, they have had issues with rattlesnakes in the bathrooms. No thanks!
We also found Bighorn sheep on our drive through the tunnel at Zion, and went back for 3 days finding them again. It was so awesome watching their interactions. The ewes must be coming into estrus because the rams were hanging around and starting to be a bit more aggressive. We also had the chance to watch 5 deer across the creek from us. Two bucks, a doe and her twins would walk back and forth on the other side. It was our refuge away from all the people in the park. I was truly shocked at how many people were in this park. It made Yellowstone look less populated.
Next time I will talk about going to Bryce Canyon NP. We ended up going twice as Dave lost about 1000 pictures off the camera. So we went back for more. Works for me.