The hanging garden over the lower Emerald Pool
We left the Panguitch area this morning and made the 70 minute drive to the East entrance of Zion National Park. Immediately upon entering the park, the view was beautiful on all sides. This area known as the East Canyon main road has a spectacular artery named the Zion-Mt.Carmel Highway. The road descended down several thousand feet with switchbacks and tunnels to the bottom. We passed Checkerboard Mesa with its unique crisscross patterns on the rock. The shorter tunnel was maybe 200 yards. The longer tunnel at 1.1 miles was built from 1927-1930 and was only a little over 11′ on the outside edge and a little over 13′ at the center line. Consequently, most all campers and other large vehicles have to drive right down the center to avoid scraping the side of their campers or tearing off their roof mounted AC unit. To do this, the park has effectively made the tunnel a 1 way roadway. They charge $15 to each oversize vehicle to defray the cost of the rangers who man each side of the tunnel. It was not a bad wait for us- maybe 20 minutes. Upon reaching the bottom, we made the turn toward the visitor center. Zion NP at one time allowed vehicles to drive the entire main road, but starting in the late 90’s, the park banned all regular automobile traffic on the main park road, Zion Scenic Road. Probably a good thing, since Zion Scenic was known as much for being a parking lot as for the activities along the road. We had been warned that the main parking lot would likely fill and the warning was well deserved. We circled the parking lot numerous times (ours and the other cars were like buzzards waiting for the kill) but to no avail. We made the short drive out the South park gate, finally found a parking spot in Springdale, and caught the free (NP provided) shuttle back to the visitor center. After a quick chat with the ranger, we boarded one of the park’s shuttle buses. We passed the park’s human history museum, the canyon junction stop and the Court of the Patriarchs without stopping. We could see the peaks of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (the Patriarchs) from the moving tour bus. We got off the tour bus at the Zion Lodge stop and had a great picnic lunch under the fantastic shade of a huge Cottonwood tree on the front lawn of the lodge. (The first irony that I will say with a name like Zion it should be heavenly- but the temperatures today were not heavenly). After lunch, we made our way across
Looking down canyon from the Kayenta trail
the street and over the bridge that runs across the Virgin River. We hiked the easy paved Emerald Pools trail to the Lower Pool. It had a beautiful overhanging ledge with a hanging garden that was very pretty (and cool). Instead of returning back, we caught the end of the Kayenta Trail which took us to the next tour bus stop, The Grotto. We re-boarded the tour bus and went to the next stop, the Weeping Rock. After making the short but relatively steep hike we were rewarded with another beautiful spring and hanging garden. Coming back down we let Victoria and Thomas play for a while under the bridge in the Virgin River. With the forced hiking they were doing, we were afraid if we didn’t let them there would be a revolt. We continued on further to the next stop, Big Bend, and got off for just a short time to view The Great White Throne sandstone monolith. Our last stop at the end of the road was Temple of Sinawava- we considered (briefly) getting off and hiking the 2.2 mile Riverside Walk but just couldn’t muster the energy. We stayed on the bus and made our way back down through all the same stops and stopped at the Visitor Center. We considered having dinner at the very nice Red Rock Grill at Zion Lodge but decided instead to just have cold ice cream cones in the Lodge lobby since we were all so hot and tired. We made our way back to our car and left the park through the east entrance again. We did see a group of 4-5 Bighorn Sheep in the distance. We made the 70 minute return ride home with just 10 minutes before the pool closed. The kids had no time to change and just jumped in right in their hiking clothes! I ran back into town and grabbed a quick dinner for us and we relaxed for a while before going to sleep exhausted. Tomorrow we are on to Bryce Canyon!
The view from under Weeping Rock