ZION'S NATIONAL PARK

The national parks are currently having a free week of entrance fees. So last Friday we drove down to St. George, stayed with Juanita, then Saturday morning went to Zion's National Park. Ralph and I took Mattina Ann with us, then we met Sherry Ann & Tanner & Geremy at 1:00 p.m. Aaron and AJ couldn't come because of other committments.

Our first hike of the day was on a trail called Watchman trail. It started off at the Zion's Visitors Center. It wasn't too long or hard. None of the one's we went on were too steep. We do want to go back and take in an all day hike.

Then we went up to Weeping Rock. This picture is actually taken from another trail to Hidden Canyon. We weren't able to finish this hike because we had to meet Sherry Ann at Zion's Lodge. We were to meet her at 12:30, be we decided it would take her longer to get there than we planned, so we went there for 1:00. We got off the shuttle and looked for her, then the next shuttle drove up and she was on it. Perfect timing for all of us.

After lunch we went up the Emerald Pools trails and this pool and waterfall are at the third pool. This picture is actually at the end of the paved canyon. The shuttle driver said all the falls we took pictures of will be gone in about a month. This was a great time to go, not too hot or cold.

I was excited to see the beauties of the world. I've been wanting to go to Arches National Park, but we decided to go see Zion's this past weekend. We've never really hiked around there before.

On our way up to the pools, Ralph had to hold a rock for us. The man behind him took his turn holding the rock after Ralph.

This is the most north we could go. It's where the Narrow's trail starts. It is closed because of the water flow. This was our last spot to go. Now to just get back a mile to the shuttle.

When we were on the Shuttle we saw climbers in mid climb of the straight up rocks.

When we rode the shuttle down to the visitors center we spoke with a man that took some of his gear up to a starting point and set it up so he can spend the next 3 days on the side of the mountain. He showed us a picture of the unit he sleeps on when he's on the side of the mountain. It's just a flat surface that is attached into the mountain. He was climbing alone, so it will take a couple of days to climb up and back.

Ralph noted that he was the only cool hiker with his plaid shorts on. Everyone else had boring plain shorts. He's my stylin' hubby.