Tax Dollars Well Spent

THE TRIP – Day 6

Zion National Park

50 miles 

We got up early for our Zion National Park visit, driving the scenic twisty 25 miles from our hotel in Hurricane to the entrance of the park. The websites for most of the national parks warn visitors that the parking lots fill up by 10 a.m., encouraging them to come early or come late if they want any chance of finding a parking spot in the park. We took the warnings seriously, getting to Zion (and the Grand Canyon and Yosemite) by 8 a.m. and finding ample parking.

The amazing shuttle bus amidst the scenery...

From May through November, Zion National Park closes its main road to all car traffic. It, instead, provides an excellent free shuttle bus service throughout the park, taking hikers to trailheads and sightseers to overlooks, or providing air-conditioned comfort to those who just want to look out the large bus windows and open sky-lights. Rarely do the words “tax dollars well-spent” flit across my mind, but spending the day using Zion's shuttle system, the words did just that. Buses promised to come every ten minutes. They came more frequently. There was taped tour-like information piped into the sound system, telling about the features of the park. The bus drivers would add their own color commentary between taped speakers and were a wealth of information. The only downside for me was the jarring realization that we truly were POACA*. There was a sign in the front of the bus asking that riders give up those seats for the disabled and elderly when needed. Whenever we stepped on a bus, people would jump up and offer us seats. We would decline. “We're fine, really...” “Ask us again at 4 o'clock this afternoon”, my husband would say.

Water hikers in the Virgin River

We rode the shuttle directly to the end of the almost nine mile road for our first hike. A friend who had previously hiked Zion recommended the Riverside Walk there, a relatively level trail along the Virgin River through a shaded canyon. At the end of the trail (for us), hikers who had water shoes and wading sticks would continue on for a nine plus mile round trip hike, walking in the shallow, rocky river as the canyon walls narrowed until they could touch opposite walls simultaneously. It looked like fun, but the estimated hiking time was eight hours, so we hopped on the shuttle and went to hike to the Weeping Rock, the Lower Emerald Pools and visited every overlook on the shuttle route. The Court of the Patriarchs was my personal favorite view, three towering 6,800+ft. rock formations, named by a Methodist minister for the Old Testament patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. When we first approached them in the shuttle bus, they loomed so tall that their peaks could only be seen out of the bus's skylights. Again, ...awe...some... and impossible to fully capture with a camera.

The Court of the Patriarchs  

Weeping Rock

The Great White Throne

The day was hot, and Zion is a strange hybrid of desert and river valley, very warm in the sun, but cool and pleasant in the shade, with small trickles of water running down the canyon walls allowing for vegetation to grow. After a long day of short hikes, we rested under a huge shade tree outside the Zion Lodge. I fought the temptation to take a serious nap on the cool grass under the tree. I was surrounded by hikers who may have fought the same temptation, but had obviously lost...

The California Condor

The national parks all have excellent ranger programs, something we did not intentionally seek out, our main priority being hikes and scenic overlooks. But we encountered a ranger with telescopes set up to view a hole in a cliff face, an active nest of the rare California condor. (“Tax dollars well-spent” flitted across my mind again...) While we were viewing the nesting area through the telescopes, the condor came out and flew above the cliff, riding the thermals before returning to its nest. I used my husband's paparazzi-quality zoom lens to capture a rare close-up shot of the huge bird in flight.

It was late in the day, and we would still have the 25 miles to drive back to our hotel. We took one last ride on the shuttle bus, again refusing the front seats, and just sat back in air-conditioned bliss as we traveled the entire loop of the Zion canyon road without getting out once, just enjoying the views along the way one last time. Tax...dollars...well...spent...

*People Of A Certain Age

National parks are the best idea we ever had. Absolutely American, absolutely democratic, they reflect us at our best rather than our worst. - Wallace Stegner

Next:

Just the Right Amount of Wrong?

The Trip – Day 7

Hurricane, Utah – Valle, Arizona

Las Vegas, Hoover Dam

381 miles