Zion National Park
Every year, Adam works at the Outdoor Retailer Expo in Salt Lake City with his company, so it's sort of our tradition to spend some time exploring Utah either before or after the trade show. (Last year, we just hung around SLC after the show.) This year, we chose to head down beforehand and visited Salt Lake City, Park City, Midway, and St. George. We stayed at three different AirBnB rentals this trip and really enjoyed every one. We always love getting to know people through AirBnB!
At our rental in St. George, our hosts were a sweet older couple who had the most beautiful home. We stayed two nights there and couldn't get over the view we had from our bedroom. They even made homemade waffles for us in the morning, complete with fresh fruit, homemade whipped cream, and freshly squeezed orange juice. We didn't visit with them for very long though because we spent practically all of our time at Zion. Luckily, because winter isn't the most popular time of year for people to visit, the park was pretty dead and not very crowded.
Adam used to live in Utah, so he's been all over the state and has visited Zion a handful of times, but I had only been there once before. I went on a month long camping trip in high school where I got to visit 14 or 15 different National Parks around the country, and Zion was one of them. That was quite a long time ago though, so I don't really remember a lot of it. Seeing Zion again was pretty awesome. I think it's one of my favorite National Parks.
Have I mentioned before how much I LOVE Utah? There's something really magical about that state and the way its colors and rock formations produce such an unbelievably gorgeous scene. It almost feels like you're on another planet! Not that I know what that feels like...
It was chilly outside, but not too bad. We had just come from Park City where it was -8 on New Years Eve, so the 45-50 degree weather felt like a heatwave to us! A lot of the trails were closed because of the ice though. Every now and then we would hear something that sounded like a crack of thunder, but it was just a huge ice chunk falling off a rock somewhere in the distance.
If you look closely, you'll see a family of bighorn sheep! Adam and I were heading over to search for the opening of a slot canyon and ran into these guys. It was crazy because they blend in so well! We saw one, and then one turned into six, and then I said, "Oh, shit! Let's get the hell out of here," and scurried our way back up the icy hill. It was terrifying, though I later found out that they probably would have left us alone, but you never know. Whenever I see an animal in the wild with babies, I stay far, far away! Those horns are pretty intimidating.
This trip was a much needed mini-vacation before I started up at school full-time on January 4th. It's been a rough week trying to adjust to work and school... I'm already exhausted, but I'm sure I'll manage and get into the groove soon. Looking at these photos again sure does make me wish we could just turn around and go right back, though!
Have you ever been to Zion?