Thursday, June 30, 2011

I walked in Zion (National Park)

Tonight I just got back from a fabulous three-day vacation. I saw wonderful Utah sites I’ve never visited before, had the opportunity to bond with my aunt and two cousins and now can’t wait to share the pictures with all of you. Ready or not here they come!

Just to give you a little context on this visit, it was 105 degrees in the park that day. Yikes! Since I go to Yellowstone every year, I would consider myself somewhat experienced with proper trail behavior. In this case, I feel like I acted more like a novice than an experienced hiker. If I could go do it again I would definitely leave my purse behind and bring my trail backpack instead, but since it was such a short trip I didn’t figure I needed to do so. Oh well! I still had a fabulous time.

Here’s interesting thing No. 1. I know Utah is known for the red dirt, but I didn’t realize we have roads made out of it! This is the road leading to the park, and the view from the shuttle that takes you around the park.

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Here we are at the gates.

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Our first stop: the Court of the Patriarchs.

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Next we took the short hike out to see Emerald Pool. I was distressed to discover I don’t actually have any pictures of the lake itself. Oops! But I do have some from the trail along the way. We were pretty sure that the white mountain in the picture on the right is the back of the Great White Throne.

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Brave hikers

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The Organ and the Great White Throne and the other picture is Angel’s Landing. Part of me is intrigued at the idea of hiking up it, well the part that isn’t terrified of dying on such a perilous hike. I’m still debating whether I should add it to my bucket list or not. Thoughts?Smile

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We also decided to do the short hike that would take us to the entrance to the Narrows even if we weren’t planning to hike the Narrows ourselves. Here are a few pictorial highlights. The one on the top right is an actual swamp that exists at the bottom of the canyon in the middle of the desert, ironically enough.

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Cool rock on the left and an interesting bowl shape on the right. Who spilled milk all over the rocks?! J/K!

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Now that is one hearty tree! Next to it is one of the hanging gardens that are frequently seen throughout the canyon.

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The entrance to the Narrows. I’m so glad we walked there, even if we didn’t do the actual hike.

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Finally, here we have Zion at sunset as we left the park. So beautiful!

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