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| ZION NATIONAL PARK, taken from the Visitor Center (where we luckily found a parking place --after driving around a bit) |
Hello Blog Friends, How are you? I am fine --and still going through a gazillion pictures from our West Trip to Utah and Arizona from September 6- 21, 2017. This is my 4th post from that trip --and I've only gotten through a few of my pictures.... ha
Today--I will share pictures from ZION National Park. We were there on Sept. 15 on a gorgeous day in Utah... Zion is absolutely gorgeous --and that is why SO MANY MANY people go there. We love seeing Zion but do NOT like all of the traffic/busses/people, etc. For that reason, I never put this one on my list of FAVORITE parks.
Our favorite parts of Zion are NOT the 'canyon' area where we HAVE to ride that darn shuttle bus up and back... We did do that on this trip ---but we didn't stop and get off at the various places along the way. We rode the bus all of the way to the top so that we could hike some of the Narrows Trail --which we had read about SO MUCH.... We did that --and hiked all of the way to the end ---where people get in the water (Virgin River) and hike farther into the canyon... The Narrows area is beautiful and we enjoyed our hike into the beginnings of that canyon. Needless to say, I will leave the hiking-in-water stuff to others!!!!! ha
The most gorgeous part of Zion to us is the drive from Mt. Carmel into the park on Scenic Highway 9.... We LOVE that area ---so most of my pictures today were taken along that scenic area... There are many pull-offs ---so we took advantage of that and took many pictures...
The longest tunnel I have ever been in I think is along that route, about 1.1 miles...
HERE is some info if you want to know more about this unique tunnel.
Hope you enjoy our pictures today of Zion.... Hope you can visit that area someday if you haven't been there.... Go during the OFF-season (NOT in Summer) to avoid a few of the crowds... AND--go early early early in the morning!!!!
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| Scenic Highway 9 into beautiful ZION National Park |
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| Scenic Highway 9 --with Zion's beauty all around us |
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| More beauty from Scenic Highway 9 |
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| I took this picture of George as we prepared to go through the BIG tunnel. |
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| Once we got out of the tunnel and started heading down the mountain, we could look back and see one of the openings inside that tunnel which we had just gone through. (The tunnel is VERY dark --except for a few of these openings.) |
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| While heading down toward the canyon area below, we could look back at all of the huge mountains around us. |
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| Another view of the vastness of the mountains in this area |
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| A happy lady enjoying Zion!!! |
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| Our hike in the Needles Area of Zion; That is a very muddy Virgin River (after the rain from the previous day) |
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| Our trail along the canyon walls, paralleling the Virgin River |
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| The end of the 'nice' trail; From here on, one has to get their feet (and probably more) WET.... |
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| Wonder if George was pondering whether to get his feet wet?????????? ha |
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| I enjoyed sitting in the Narrows area --enjoying the views around me... (Don't know why my hands were positioned like that!!!! ha... Maybe I was getting ready to play the piano on my knees!!!!!) |
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| Another picture from the Visitor Center at Zion (I LOVE see the flag blowing in the breeze.) |
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| Finally, here is a picture of US taken along Scenic Highway 9 in Zion National Park, 9/15/17 |
Hope you enjoyed today's pictures.... Zion really is a gorgeous park. I don't want to discourage anyone from going there because of the crowds.... Just plan your trip during the off seasons (even though it is still busy then --but not AS busy) ---and go early in the mornings....
Have a great week.
Hugs,
