Zion National Park

April 18-27th-We had a wonderful time at Zion National Park.  Zion is mentioned many times in the Bible and at one point was used in reference to Jerusalem but now is considered to mean sanctuary or in God’s presence.  It is truly a special, sanctuary  place and we kept extending our stay because we liked it so much. The red cliffs (Navajo sandstone) and canyons are magnificent.  We did some great hikes.  One day we hiked to the top of Observation Point (8 miles of steep, strenuous hiking).  Janae and Stefan did awesome but I was a little squeamish skirting the open drop off at the summit.  There was a spectacular slotted canyon on the way up that we have stored in our memory because I forgot the camera that day.  The bird calls of the canyon wrens were beautiful.  They are called the song of the canyon. We did get our photo at the top overlooking the whole Zion valley from a fellow buckeye we met at the top.  We explored all the hikes from the shuttle drop offs.  Janae and Mark did a special hike from the court of the Patriarchs (Abraham, Issac and Jacob) e they encountered deafening frog sounds and a glorious sunset.  They took Stefan and me the next day and we enjoyed it too.  The hanging gardens are really nice.  When the water seeps through the porous sandstone and meets the hard shale, the water pours out and creates a waterfall effect over a carved out canyon that you can hike under.  Very cool.

We met awesome people during our stay in Zion.  We met a wonderful family from Australia with an 8 yr. old daughter and 4 yr. old son.  We enjoyed connecting with them and having them for a spontaneous dinner at Miss Jim B.  We all fell in love with their accents and personalities.  We talked about house swapping.ont, Colorado who have 9 children and one on the way.  They are quite remarkable and Janae really enjoyed talking and playing with their 10 year old, Hope. 

We left Zion for a day to meet up with our Australian friends in Bryce Canyon.  Bryce is beautiful and the red, delicately formed rocks against the azure blue skies was tnning.  We loved meandering through the formations with our down under friends and then enjoyed a wonderful dinner at their camper before taking in a ranger led astronomy program.  It turned out to be a lecture on light pollution.  Interesting but not what we had in mind.  After the program, we got to look at Saturn, Mars and some galaxies with some telescopes they had set-up.  The highlight was seeing the shooting stars.  We wanted to set our alarms to wake up and see the meteorite shower but since we didn’t get back to Zion until 12:30 a.m., it didn’t happen.

The education programs in Zion are fantastic.  The best we’ve experienced so far.  The campground had an amphitheatre where we attended an excellent bird and bat program.  We also attended a ranger led hike to the emerald pools and a als in zion.  We enjoyed learning about the collared lizards (Stefan was constantly catching these blue bellied creatures) and about the shrews.  Hadn’t realized that they attacked animals (smetimes as big as 4 times their size) with their venomous saliva.  Also, learned about sparrow hawks who hover over their prey.

Stefan really got into being a junior ranger.  It has been a fight to get him to do them but he did an exceptional job on his workbook this week and the ranger really complimented him.  Suddenly he became very excited about the 25 he’s gotten so far, got them out and studied them.  One day, he got up and got dressed all in green and was proud to display some of his badges on his sleeve.  When he donned his junior ranger hat, he looked like he was ready to work for the park service.

Did a lot of biking this week.  Great trail that went through the ey of the canyon that was right next to the camp ground.  Highlights were riding late with Stefan one night looking for bats and spotting them as we perched on a large rock.  Another was riding as a family to hike the Patriarchs, eat lunch at the lodge and then coasting downhill back to our campsite.

Speaking of campsites, the first 6 nights, we stayed in the site that we reserved back in Jan..  It was kind of jammed in with other campers and wasn’t anything special.  The last two nights we stayed at the south campground where they take no reservations.  We stayed one night along a little babbling brook where Stefan and Janae loved racing bark boats and the last night we got the premo site, #77, right on the river with incredible views.  Mark said it was his favorite spot so far.

The world's best practice room right outside our front door

Our backyard

loved floating my bark boats

Miss Jim B was quite happy here

view from our front door

Mark and I got some good practicing in this week ad the kids got going again with piano and made good strides in school.  Stefan finished his 2A Singapore Math book.  The only negative about our time here was the surplus of caterpillars that were everywhere and made it their business to be always crawling on your feet, chairs, tables, etc..  Stefan said to bad Grandpa Bell wasn’t here to burn the larve cases with his torch.  He fondly remembers doing this with Grandpa while Grandpa said, “fry, baby, fry.”

Our last day was very special.  We decided to stay an extra day and not do school.  Had a marvelous time biking the valley trail again and painting the landscape out our front door while Mark went up in the canyon to practice.  It was just a laid back day where we hung out by the campground.  Our Colorado friends dropped by and we visited and played with them for awhile. After lunch, Janae painted at the table while Stefan and I snuggled and napped.  I practiced awhile down by the river.  We left around 5:30 to hike the Angel’s Landing trail.  It was misty and rainy but we had a great time.  On the way up, Janae talked non-stop how she wanted to do ROTC in the Army.  We talked about the differences in nursing and doctor’s training.  We talked about nurse practioners and she wanted to know if she could do pediatric nurse prac. in the army.  Said she couldn’t wait for college because it seems fun and the first thing she would buy would be a crock-pot.  On the way down, Stefan held my hand and said how he thought Zion was his favorite national park.  He asked if there was such a thing as a master national park.  He told me about a lizard that he spotted on the other side of the canyon.  I commented about his great eyesight and he said that when he found out that pilots needed good eyesight he started eating lots of carrots.  Now he said he’s not sure that he wants to be a pilot.  He’s thinking he might want to be a creation scientist working for the creation museum.  He then went on to describe the Cars 2 movie  in detail because he wanted me to see it.  Priceless conversations and memories.  Moments like these bring it home with why we’re doing this year.  After a late pizza and popcorn supper, we fell asleep to the glorious river sounds.

Our last morning, I got up early and drove to a canyon trail and hiked a little ways in.  I played my trombone with the glorious echo and bird calls.  Just awesome.  A highlight was the hummingbird who hovered in front of me while I played the 2nd movement of the Casterade. 

A very special place and so thankful we got to experience it.  Now on to Hoover Dam and then San Diego.