Zion National Park

Back for a minute from a long road trip to Zion National Park. For those of you who are like: "Huh? Where's that?" and you're not feeling like Googling it...it's in the Southwestern corner of Utah.

Beautiful country. "God's country." -Geeze when I say that...some part of me squirms and thinks: "Man...this feels like the adult version of believing in the Easter Bunny or Santa." Does he exist? I'm not sure. What I'm pretty sure of is, I don't know...and you don't know...but I guess we'll all find out one day. But I digress...

I went with my little cousins, Jenna (13), and Daniel (10). For a long time, I had been wanting to do something nice for both them and their parents. So, I called them up and invited them. Luckily, everyone was up to the impromptu adventure. :) And it was a blast!

The drive down took FOREVER! Practically 24 hours! Primarily because of some heinous pockets of traffic that we hit on I-5. It seemed to get worse the closer to the L.A. area we got. There were two spots where we spent about 3 hours (in each spot) going about 5 miles an hour. :p But by the time we got into Zion...it was all worth it!

We spent most of our time there cycling through a few activities. The average day was an amalgamation of: sleep until you're sweaty and hot, get up and go swimming in the river, play, laugh, talk, relax, then when we're cooled down...at some point we'd notice that we were hungry...so we'd head back to camp, make some food, eat our meal (usually with s'mores), wash up, get our heads cool by running them under cold water, then take a nap from the food coma. :) Rinse and repeat. It was a good time.

I didn't have time to do the hiking that I had planned on. An executive decision was made to forgo the hikes this trip. After running it by Jenna and Daniel, it became apparent that they were much more interested in going swimming rather than the *awesome* hike through The Narrows.

So...I made the decision to go do things that we would all enjoy and just relax. I made the right call. We had so much fun. And on the ride home, we stopped in Las Vegas for lunch! Ahhhh Las Vegas....how I love you for your amazingly clean public restrooms. Casino's and Mormons...they have the cleanest restrooms. :) (It's the little things in life that make it all worth it.) ;)

We took a different route home, and cut through the Nevada desert. Meandering through one horse towns like Beatty, Goldfield, and Tonopah. The drive home went much faster, due in large part to the overwhelming *nothingness* that is the Nevada countryside. No SoCal traffic! :)

We stopped to get gas, sandwiches and of course try on hats. :)

Lookin' good Daniel! 

So...I'm definitely going back to Zion. Next time, I will pack lighter -take waaaaay less clothes. Jenna and I agreed that one pretty much only needs to take their swimsuit, PJ's, and a pair of shorts. (the shorts are optional) :) As well as the PJ's....OK...so you only need to take a swimsuit. :D And I'll slot more time to enjoy the scenery once I'm there.