4 Wheels 4 Girls

On April 28th, we entered Zion National Park- through a tunnel!

Zion is just gorgeous; there is every kind of beauty in the park. Mountains, canyons, wildlife, all the beautiful things you would find in a national park. Dad said it would be one of the most spectacular views on the entire trip, and he was so right. To enter the park, we had to drive through a super long tunnel that was carved through a mountain. It was awesome. With that I knew the actual park would be amazing.

We parked at the visitor center, and Ellie and I had our most terrifying experience there. There were caterpillars. Lots and lots of them. THOUSANDS of caterpillars. I absolutely HATE crawly things. Roaches, caterpillars, spiders… Ellie is scared of that kind of thing too. They were everywhere; I know I stepped on at least twenty, and I tried SO hard not to get their nasty guts all over my shoes. I took a picture of a pole covered in them to show you how many there were. Here it is: (EEEEEEEEEEEEEWWWW!!!)

Oh my gosh this has got to be one of the grossest things I have ever seen!

We took a shuttle around Zion Canyon to see all the great views, and then we rode to meet our ranger for a talk about how the canyon was formed. The ranger’s name was Adrienne and her talk was very interesting. She talked about the colors in the canyon walls, the Virgin River, (the river that carved the canyon) and the age of the rocks and the different layers in the canyon walls. Ana really liked the talk, or maybe she just really liked Adrienne. She followed her around during the entire walk. Jean joked that maybe Ana thought that the ranger was her mama and that she had lost her mama like a little duck in a story we know. Here she is, like a baby duck behind her mama duck:

Like a mama duck with her ducklings

After the ranger talk, we took the shuttle to The Grotto, a bus stop where our trailhead was. We were hiking the Angels’ Landing trail, but we weren’t going all the way to the top ’cause it was going to start getting dark and the last bit of the trail was steep and terrifying. The path was paved, but it was steep and tiring to walk up. When we reached the top we realized there was still quite a bit to go, but at least we were under the shade of the canyon walls. There was a cool little cave on the side of the trail, and we took our picture in it:

Isn't that a great little cave? Very cozy!

When we reached Walter’s Wiggles, I knew that we were almost to our destination, Scout’s Lookout. Walter’s Wiggles is an incredibly steep part of the trail with 21 switchbacks (I counted!) that is the last part before Scout’s Lookout. It’s also the toughest part before Scout’s Landing.

Stella is looking down at the wiggles (in her new hat!). You might be able to spot me near the very bottom.

We were all tired and hungry but we made it up anyway, huffing and puffing. We scarfed down our sandwiches at the top, grateful that we had packed dinner. After that Dad, Stella, and I decided to try a little bit of the rest of the trail leading to Angels’ Landing. We barely made it up at all because of the insane steepness of the “path” (there wasn’t really a path; there were just chains to grab on to) and we were basically hanging off the edge of the canyon. Dad was terrified that one of us would slip and fall so we turned around.

There we are on the trail to Angel's Landing!

The hike back was a breeze because the air was much cooler and the whole thing was downhill. We chatted, ate cookies, and had a good time. Ellie and Ana did a great dance show for us near the bottom.

Sunset on the cliffs in Zion Canyon

When we finished it wasn’t even dark. We hopped on the shuttle and rode back to the visitor center, where we were parked. Most of the caterpillars were up in the trees by then so it wasn’t as bad, but I swear at least one fell in my hair. It was horrifying.

I loved the first day in Zion; now read on to find out about our other days at the park! 😀