Day 4: Zion National Park, Utah

jamie — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 06:30:57 +0000

We had a fantastic day today touring Zion National Park and the surrounding area in southern Utah. We were woken this morning around 6:30AM by an extremely loud noise – it sounded like an explosion and the entire room shook for at least 10 seconds. It turns out it was just thunder, the likes of which we’ve never heard before. We were disappointed to find it was raining heavily when we got up and thought our day of sightseeing was ruined. Thankfully while we were getting breakfast the rain slowed and on the 1.5 hour drive to Zion National Park the rain stopped altogether and the sun came out with a beautiful blue sky. It was a fantastic day from that point forward.

Zion National Park is indescribable in its beauty. The entire area is composed of sandstone and the unique geology of the region makes for some breathtaking landscapes. With all the natural beauty, we couldn’t resist taking literally several hundred photos and narrowing down the photos to share with you this evening was quite a task – there are more than normal but we couldn’t resist! I’m not sure these photos can entirely do the park justice, but I hope they can convey some of the natural beauty we saw today.

I have to say, when I thought of these types of landscapes in the past, I would have thought of Arizona, never Utah. I had no idea how beautiful Utah is and of how much there is to see and do – there are many, many National Parks in southern Utah, I only wish we had time to see more of them. I think there will be a return visit sometime in the future!

BTW – we really appreciate receiving all your comments on posts, even if we don’t have the time to respond to each individually (our Internet access is limited each day). We do read and appreciate each one – please keep them coming!

Driving down Utah highway 89 South to Zion National Park

Panoramic vista just outside the park entrance. Click to view the larger version!

Us at Zion National Park Entrance!

Typical example of the scenery inside Zion National Park

These mountain cliffs form the walls of a very, very deep canyon which you drive down into on your way into the park.

One of many beautiful views in Zion Canyon inside the park

Me in a tree! We were hiking and I couldn't find an unobstructed view (from other trees) of the landscape so I had to climb up to get it!

Beautiful yellow tree in the park - click through to view a larger version.

Autumn in Zion Canyon

Dominique checking out the river in Zion Canyon

Beautiful fall foliage in Zion National Park

Interesting cacti in a beautiful landscape

Zion Canyon Walls illuminated at Sunset

Day 4: Heading to Zion National Park

JandD — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 14:00:06 +0000

After doing some research last night, we realized we were a bit optimistic with our sight-seeing plans. First of all, each of the national parks charge a $25 entrance fee, so making a quick trip to 3-4 parks in 1-2 days is just not affordable or sensible. Finally, not all the sights we hoped to see (Antelope Canyon in particular) are open this time of year. Also, they require more time than we realized to see the sights. It really makes more sense to pick a single park and see it properly than park hopping as we had originally planned. Our plan now is to head to Zion National Park today and spend the entire day there, then stop in Hurricane, UT for the night. This is the route:

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J and D's Travel Blog » Zion National Park

Day 4: Zion National Park, Utah

Day 4: Heading to Zion National Park