Road Trip Days 7 & 8 :: Zion National Park

Leaving Grand Canyon, we needed to stop in a city to do laundry, get an oil change and other odds and ends so we spent about 3 hours in Page, AZ.  It was a nice town, but still not that large.  {Their only Starbucks was in a grocery store!}  We are finding that there are still A LOT of small towns exist and have NOT been pushed out by the "chain" stores and restaurants.  

The drive to Zion was beautiful!  I love the southwest!

When we arrived at Zion, we found out that their campgrounds were full so we set up camp just outside the east entrance at Zion RV and Campground.  We went into Zion after setting up our tent and visited the Visitor's Center.  Zion is very organized and you get around by parking your car and taking a tram to most of the hiking areas. Cars aren't even permitted and this actually eliminates a lot of stress and pressure. We took the tram to the Zion Lodge and took the Lower Emerald Trail.  It was a beautiful {and very hot} walk.

Afterwards, we went back to camp. There was a burning ban within the National Park, but our campgrounds was allowing controlled fires. They only sold "Stump Stoves," which are large pieces of wood carved in the center and a hole on the side.  You place burning sticks into the top and face the side hole towards the wind and it is supposed to catch on fire. It worked... after awhile, and I was just not impressed with it's hotdog cooking skills.

The next day we got up and spent the day in Zion.  First we did two hikes. The first was "easy" and called Weeping Rock. The second one was "strenuous" and called Hidden Canyon. It was super steep and then took us along cliff edges.  It was crazy.

After our morning hikes, we went back to the car to eat lunch and then sat by the river for a few hours on a rock just reading. We were going to go into the river because it was so hot but clouds rolled in and we didn't need to because it cooled off. We ended the day in the park with a River Walk.

For dinner we went into Springdale (just a couple miles West of Zion) and ate dinner at a restaurant called Orange Star.  It was a very relaxing day in Zion.