We rode the shuttle all the way to the back on Zion Canyon for our first hike, the Riverside Walk.
The Riverside Walk was an easy 2.2 mile round trip walk on a paved trail.
The yellowing trees were gorgeous against the backdrop of the canyon walls and blue fall sky.
And those canyon walls were way on up there.
The squirrels along the walkway were very accustomed to people. This little squirrel didn't scamper off the path when we came near like most squirrels would do. We had to walk around him.
At the very end of the trail, you can walk down to North Fork of the Virgin River. This is where one of Zion's most popular hikes starts called The Narrows.
The Narrows involves walking through a narrow canyon as well as walking through the river in many places. I was hoping we could see down into The Narrows but this was the most we could see without getting our feet wet. We saw a couple start to walk back to The Narrows but once they felt how cold that water was, they turned around and came back.
After resting for a few minutes,
we started back down the trail.
We could see water seeping out of the canyon walls in some places...
...and above us here was what looked like a dirt/sand ledge (rather than rock) with grass and plants growing out of the top of it.
As we finished the Riverside Walk, those big, tall canyon walls made you feel very small.
We rode the shuttle to the next stop: a short, paved but steep hike...
...up to Weeping Rock.
We walked under the ledge of Weeping Rock...
...and got rained on by Weeping Rock's tears. :)
We rode the shuttle to our next stop, The Grotto, hiked the Kayenta trail and the Lower Emerald Falls trail for a total of 1.6 miles. The Lower Emerald Falls trail ends at the next shuttle stop at Zion Lodge.
The Kayenta Trail was a slightly more difficult with more rocks to step around and over...
...but the views from the Kayenta Trail were gorgeous!
It was right about here that we were joined by Jen, a Zion park ranger.
What a treat! Jen was like having our own personal tour guide for the rest of the hike.
She pointed out different things along the trail and answered our questions like "what are the scratches and the etchings on the canyon walls from?"
We had assumed it was from glaciers but Jen told us this was layers of sand that hardened over the millions of years and become Navajo Sandstone which is what Zion (and most of Utah) is made of. The red in the rock is from iron. The redder the rock the more iron that is in it.
O.K. Jen. Got another question for you. What is this weird looking bug we saw on the Riverside Walk trail?
To us, it looked like a mutated really big ant with a yellow jacket stinger. Jen reached in her backpack and looked through several laminated pages with pictures of animals and insects and found that it is a Jerusalem Cricket (or potato bug).
As we were walking down the trail, Jen noticed a mom trying to get a splinter out of her child's hand. Jen stopped and asked if the mom needed any help or any tweezers (which she also had in her backpack). I told Jen her backpack was like Mary Poppins bag: it has everything you might need inside it. :)
We enjoyed visiting and talking with Jen as we walked along. She told us about her working in other parks like Yosemite and Great Falls and how much she likes Zion.
She stopped occasionally to take pictures. And, of course, I did too. Zion is just so beautiful!
At this point on the trail, we had a narrow place between two rock walls to walk through.
And then we reached the Lower Emerald Pool.
As we continued around the pool, we noticed this white stuff on the rock walls.
Jen told us that it is calcium carbonate (the same thing used in antacids).
We have met and spoken with several park rangers in our many visits to the National Parks this year. And we have been very impressed with how pleasant and very helpful the park rangers have been. But after our hike with Jen, we think she's the nicest!
After thanking Jen for walking with us, we hopped on the shuttle and headed for our last stop: The Court of the Patriachs. We walked up to the viewpoint where we could see Abraham Peak (6,890 ft),
Isaac Peak (6,825 ft),
and Jacob Peak (the white peak in the background at 6,831 ft).
We sat there on the bench enjoying our last views of Zion National Park for a few more minutes.
When we were leaving Zion, we passed by these two buck mule deer fighting with their antlers.
But by the time we stopped to get a picture, another tourist had walked up to them and they had stopped.
The town of Springdale is immediately outside the entrance of Zion. We noticed their "street lights" the first day we came to Zion and remembered to take a picture as we were leaving today.
I wouldn't think a small light bulb would be bright enough for a street light. Maybe they are trying to cut down on light pollution. :)
We had a wonderful couple of days in Zion and hope to come here again some day.
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