Day Four - Zion!
After several days of hiking, E was quite worn down. I wasn't and really wanted to check out the signature hike of Zion - Angel's Landing! (Well, that or the Narrows, but the Narrows weren't exactly doable since snow melt off had massive flash flood warnings. So there.)
I had this fantasy of checking out Angel's Landing at dawn, so decided I'd wake up early, head out there, catch the morning light, then head back and have breakfast with E. We can all guess how well this went...
Sunrise over Zion was pretty epic at least!
I started hiking. The first chunk was pretty easy - a mere 1,000 feet in a mile or so. Then we got into refrigerator canyon, which was nice, cool, and FLAT!
The wiggles were a series of short switch backs that gained another 1,500 or so feet over a mile. Very pretty, if somewhat exhausting. (It wasn't too bad, though.)
Part of the fun was that I was on the first bus over, so with the rest of the crazy hikers. A woman I ended up hiking with had been cycling through the US for the past year. She was nearly done with her tour. Another, 75 year old man, was cacheing water for his trip down as he attempted to make the climb one last time. People are so darned amusing.
More of that windy path up!
After an hour or so of climbing (it's really not that bad) I made it to Scout's Lookout, which has an admittedly awesome view. ^_^
Another view.
Although you could see the whole valley from the top (which was pretty cool), because the sun had so much glare, the pictures were kind of wonky, alas.
Anyway, I continued along to the ending, just to find that it was a scramble up a sheer rock cliff, with only a cable to stabilize, that dropped over a thousand feet:
I made it up the first mound, but then realized that - thanks to slightly sore muscles and joints + my snazzy dress, I probably wasn't up for a full half mile of this. (That would get worse.)
I slowly made my way back to the lookout.
There I got another picture of me looking lovely and slowly made my way down.
I joined E for breakfast then took off to visit weeping rock (which was cool, but the pictures are kind of weird) as well as River Walk. (Which was pretty.)
Vista around river walk.
The Narrows.
We didn't go into the Narrows both as there was a flash flood warning and it really requires special gear to do more than dabble in. (And I figured that slowly wandering around, sorely over slippery surfaces without the right gear was a rather bad idea.)
I got one last picture.
And we met yet again with our old nemesis, who was using twigs to...probably build a squirrel nest and create more squirrels. Ugh.
I had this fantasy of checking out Angel's Landing at dawn, so decided I'd wake up early, head out there, catch the morning light, then head back and have breakfast with E. We can all guess how well this went...
Sunrise over Zion was pretty epic at least!
I started hiking. The first chunk was pretty easy - a mere 1,000 feet in a mile or so. Then we got into refrigerator canyon, which was nice, cool, and FLAT!
The wiggles were a series of short switch backs that gained another 1,500 or so feet over a mile. Very pretty, if somewhat exhausting. (It wasn't too bad, though.)
Part of the fun was that I was on the first bus over, so with the rest of the crazy hikers. A woman I ended up hiking with had been cycling through the US for the past year. She was nearly done with her tour. Another, 75 year old man, was cacheing water for his trip down as he attempted to make the climb one last time. People are so darned amusing.
More of that windy path up!
After an hour or so of climbing (it's really not that bad) I made it to Scout's Lookout, which has an admittedly awesome view. ^_^
Another view.
Although you could see the whole valley from the top (which was pretty cool), because the sun had so much glare, the pictures were kind of wonky, alas.
Anyway, I continued along to the ending, just to find that it was a scramble up a sheer rock cliff, with only a cable to stabilize, that dropped over a thousand feet:
I made it up the first mound, but then realized that - thanks to slightly sore muscles and joints + my snazzy dress, I probably wasn't up for a full half mile of this. (That would get worse.)
I slowly made my way back to the lookout.
There I got another picture of me looking lovely and slowly made my way down.
I joined E for breakfast then took off to visit weeping rock (which was cool, but the pictures are kind of weird) as well as River Walk. (Which was pretty.)
Vista around river walk.
The Narrows.
We didn't go into the Narrows both as there was a flash flood warning and it really requires special gear to do more than dabble in. (And I figured that slowly wandering around, sorely over slippery surfaces without the right gear was a rather bad idea.)
I got one last picture.
And we met yet again with our old nemesis, who was using twigs to...probably build a squirrel nest and create more squirrels. Ugh.