WFRV

We make it to Zion by 9:50am which is a world record for us. Another
beautiful hot day and we start out with a 2-mile hike along the river. We
see a lot of lizards and gigantic flying black beetles, one of which tries
to attack me causing me to scream, flail my arms and run around like a
lunatic in true girly fashion. This has Ben laughing for a good thirty
minutes. The trail ends at Zion Lodge where we grab some lunch in the
fanciest restaurant we've been to so far. We spend the lunch cracking each
other up with all the ridiculous comments we've heard each other make on the
trip (sample: "if it's good enough for the toilet it's good enough for
me"). After lunch we grab the Zion shuttle which is the only way to get
from point to point in the park. When Zion opened they got seventy visitors
a day; now they're up to seventy thousand, and the shuttle is their attempt
to squeeze five thousand cars into five hundred parking spots.

Departing the shuttle at the end we follow a trail that heads north into the
canyon. It's paved for a while and then it turns into The Narrows, where
the canyon walls are twenty feet apart and the Virgin River fills the canyon
floor. Many people forge ahead past where the trail ends and so do we. We're
in swift-flowing water up to our knees, sometimes our thighs, and we keep
our shoes on because the floor of the river is rock-filled and hard to
navigate. It's fun, although Sam falls in a few times (we wonder if it's on
purpose) and her cute white clothes become completely see-through. Better
her than me! At one point we watch the people in front of us go in up to
their chests and Mike decides to turn back. The kids and I move ahead,
sticking close behind a woman in bare feet who manages to find the best
route possible for another fifteen minutes up the river. At that point I
see dark storm clouds overhead and hear the rumble of thunder, and having
read several signs about what to do in case of flash flood ("wedge yourself
into a high crack above the water level"), I decide we should head back.
When we return to the paved trail we venture into the river one last time,
balancing on rocks to wash the silt and rocks out of our sneakers and socks.
It's so incredibly dry up here in this mountainous desert that by the time
we get off the shuttle at our car our shoes aren't squishy wet anymore.
They're still damp but we set them in the sun at the RV park and within a
few hours they're bone dry. Hmm, it IS a dry heat. We have another
home-cooked meal and try to pack up a bit because we're heading out early
the next day to the Grand Canyon. It's not too far, only 130 miles or so,
but it's certainly not highway driving.

Seen on a t-shirt: "Rock is dead. Long live paper and scissors."

# posted by LDW @ 10:28 PM