Day 11: Zion National Park (Mon, 7/11/16)

On Day 11 we were finally at Zion, considered by some to be the jewel of the national park system.  After sleeping mostly comfortably at the RV park, we were ready to explore.

Zion has buses that take you from parking facilities to several stops with different hikes and attractions.





Here's a closer look at the rock surface.

Here's a view from inside one of the buses, which had nice skylights.

We decided on a hike that would take us to the famous Angel's Landing, a pretty difficult hike that includes some genuinely dangerous parts--narrow ridges where one is clinging to metal chains to help pull you up and stay attached to the mountain (often while someone is coming down the other way).

Here's a "starting out" selfie.



Here's the switchback trail that began our journey in earnest.



And here's what that same trail looked like on the way down.



Then up some carved out switchbacks mercifully in the shade.



And to the Angel's Landing part.



There are some shots of those metal chains I mentioned.





We decided to hike up to the mid-point ridge and not to ascend to the top.  This was in part because of the advice we read on Ryan and Christina's blog (that the view from the very top actually wasn't worth the effort), and in greater part because it looked pretty freaking scary:



The views from the mid-point were plenty amazing for us.

Apparently this part of the trail ends here:





Here are shots of Missy and me at the mid-point.  If you look closely over our right shoulders you can actually see the chains that lead up to the top a bit more clearly than in the shots above.





We stopped for a break on the way down and I had some competition for use of my backpack.

On the switchback on the way down.







After our main hike and a break for lunch we took a short hike to a "weeping rock."

Here's the view from behind some of the dripping water.



Well-deserved beer selfie after a great day of hiking and exploring.  We put the beers in a cooler underneath the car and miraculously they were still cold at 3:19 pm when this photo was taken.  We tried to give some out to fellow hike-finishers, but had few takers.



Two tired and happy cousins.



In order to get from Zion to Berkeley, one must first drive south through Vegas.  Missy had never been to Vegas, so we drove the strip.  Here's the only pic I have from that little detour.

Day 10, Part 2: On to Zion (or its environs)

After heading out of Arches, we drove across Utah towards Zion National Park.  Campsites here are very hard to come by, so we arranged to camp outside of the park at "Zion West RV Park."  As the name implies this was actually mostly an RV park but there was a small grassy area where one can camp...so we pulled up the chariot and did some low level car camping.

While there, we made some friends.  Here's Missy pictured with Guy (on the left, Missy's right)  and Justin.  Guy is living in one of the RVs (behind him, out of view), and Justin is living in the tent behind Missy to save money for college.  We ended up hanging out with these guys all evening.  Justin was even going to come into the park with us the next day to show us around but after doing the night shift at the school for kids recovering from trauma or substance abuse he was a bit too tired in the am.



Perhaps most important, it is here that our traveling toaster finally found its rightful home.  As avid readers (I know you're out there) may recall, we were lugging a $20 toaster across the country because my brother Randy (who lives in Irvine, not the Bay Area where we were headed) mentioned offhand to my mother that he could use said toaster.  Missy and I found that somewhat ridiculous in a loving "Jewish mothers do the darndest things" kind of way, so we decided to treat the toaster like a travel companion, taking photos of it in various places throughout.  Well, our new friend Justin has a pretty sweet setup in his tent including a microwave, speakers, etc.--but no toaster.



In a flash of clarity we knew that we were actually carrying the toaster this whole time not to then lug it down to LA/Irvine for my brother but rather to satisfy all of Justin's outstanding cooking needs.  The toaster had found it's highest purpose in Zion West RV Park.

Here I am with Justin and his newest cooking implement.  See the joy that you enabled, mom?



And, our beloved toaster already comfortably nestled into its new home.



To her credit (and not at all to my surprise) my mother was both amused and happy when she learned the toaster wouldn't be making it to Randy's doorstep after all.

The next morning, we woke up and headed into Zion.  First, though, we stopped for breakfast.  Anyone remember when, way back in Denver, I argued that maroon was an especially popular color for SUVs?  Behold the parking lot at our breakfast joint.  Q.E.D.

Day 10 Part 1: Arches National Park (Sun, 7/11/16)

We woke early and headed into the park.  Here was our morning view from the motel.



When we arrived inside the park we discovered there was a flaw in our plan: there are no first-come-first-served campsites in Arches during the summer.  The website was not exactly crystal clear on that.

Oh, well.  We didn't have any shade structure and so were a bit concerned about hanging out in the 100 degree heat all day after our morning hike anyway, so we adjusted our plan: now we would hike in the am and then get on the road to Zion in the afternoon.

So, on to our morning hike in Arches.  We drove 18 miles into the park to the Devil's Garden trailhead.  Here are our "before" photo and video.

The entrance to the hike.



More images from our hike below.  We were going to do a shorter 4 mile round trip hike, but when we finished the first leg we felt good and it wasn’t too hot (we had a nice breeze) so we did the longer loop around Primitive Trail, which is listed as "most difficult."  The hike was actually just moderately hard (although that may have been due to the nice breeze); the part we found most difficult was spotting the smallish stones that mark the trail on some of the big expanses of red rock.

And here's Landscape Arch.































Here is our "after" video.

Here are some pics from the way out of Arches after our hike.







Here are a couple of shots of "Balanced Rock."