Ian Smissen's Travel Diary: Zion National Park

I was woken at 6:00 AM by the alarm, having slept like an old dog. Showered, dressed, packed, checked out and fueled up (both me and the car) by 6:45, I left Las Vegas behind with no great desire to return. Las Vegas to Zion is an easy drive with only two turns from the hotel: onto I-15, off at UT-9 and keep going until you get to the park so no need for the GPS. After 20 minutes I got bored and turned on the radio - big mistake! I should have known better. It seems that it is almost impossible to find a radio station worth listening to while driving in the US. I'm sure if I lived here, I'd find radio stations with decent music or talk stations with at least one or two hosts who are not mentally impaired but if you're not in one city for more than a day or two, the only refuge is to scan the dial for stations. However, I'm not interested in inane religious platitudes, moronic "morning" shows, country music, talkback where the host is even dumber than the callers or a loud-mouthed, opinionated bully, sports shows that don't actually commentate on sport and I don't speak Spanish so I can almost never find anything worth listening to. Every now and then I stumble on an FM station that is playing half decent music but the transmitters for these stations seem to have a range of about 5 miles so they disappear as quickly as you find them. So, cutting to the chase, I found nothing so I resorted to the GPS to have Jill (Karen's US cousin - see yesterday's post) keep me company but all she said was "drive 114 miles and turn right" then said nothing more for the next 113 miles!

What is good about driving here is the Interstate highway network - four lane divided roads with good road surfaces and sensible speed limits - set the cruise control to 75 mph and go.

The I-15 sneaks through the northwest corner of Arizona on its way to Utah (Nevada becomes Arizona somewhere on the outskirts of Mesquite, a bustling little town that seems to have no reason to exist other than provide casinos, accommodation and the most magnificent looking golf course carved out of the desert, the last 15 miles or so cutting through the Virgin River Canyon.

Farewell Nevada and Arizona, and

...State #27. My criteria for claiming a visit to a state are that I must set foot in the state (not just drive through, fly over, land in an airport) and I must contribute to the local economy (i.e., spend money), so Arizona is not claimed yet - will have to wait for tomorrow.

Zion NP's main tourist attraction is the Zion Canyon Scenic Drive so that was as good a place to start as any. Approaching the park, there were signs all over the place indicating that parking was highly unlikely in the park so best to park in Springdale, the town at the entry to the park, which has a seemingly endless supply of accommodation, food outlets and souvenir and "collectibles" stores to service the park patrons. I'm not quite sure what the definition of a collectible is but I expect it's something you don't need and has no purpose other than to take up space. Most of the collectibles 'round these parts seem to be used cowboy paraphernalia.

Back to the parking, there is a free shuttle bus to the park Visitor Centre, another free shuttle inside the park and park entry is $12 for pedestrians as opposed to $25 if you're in a car so I found a park near a shuttle stop and 5 minutes later was on my way.

The Scenic Drive is a 6 mile out-and-back road up the canyon with 8 stops located at the main scenic spots and trail heads. With limited time here (I wanted to get to two other places in the afternoon), I took the shuttle all the way to the end so I could listen to the commentary in one go and decide which stops to concentrate on.

Bus station, Temple of Sinawava, Zion Canyon Scenic Drive

Highlight of the first stop was this little lizard basking on a fence post on the side of the trail. It was completely unperturbed (or scared stiff?) of the hundreds of people who came past and photographed it.

The canyon has an amazing array of cliffs and towers but you'd need to spend several days here working out what time to get to each location for the best light. Of course, late morning was not the best time for any but a few images were OK:

Having hopped on and off the shuttle at most of the stops, some for 5-6 minutes until the next shuttle arrived, others for longer with short walks to viewing areas or along the river, I was back at the visitor centre just after 1:30. Shuttle back to the car and off to Kolob Terrace Road - a steep 20-mile scenic drive that climbs north from the desert washes along the highway to the aspen and grassland plateaux of the higher elevations of the park. A few miles up, just before re-entering the park, Sunset Canyon Ranch is the first of many horse ranches along the road - pretty nice place to live and work!

Half way up the road, the habitat changes significantly to open grasslands. The weather was also changing with storms coming in from both the northwest

and southwest.

Close to the top of the plateau, aspens were common and their leaves had started to turn.

On the plateau, there is a short gravel road to Lava Point with a lookout providing views across much of the park.

On the return drive, the storms had strengthened but fortunately passed by making some spectacular scenery with dark clouds in the background and bright sunshine in the foreground.

La Verkin Overlook

The passing storms opened up the sky and hope remained for a sunset at the last stop, Kolob Canyons. Another steep, scenic drive up into the mountains, this road winds its way through a series of canyons to a lookout with a view across the canyon to the east and a wide valley to the south.