DFT16 - Day 5 & 6 - Zion and Death Valley
Two showers in less than 12 hours...what did I do to deserve such an anniversary present? Haha we both decided that when we are somewhere that actually has showers we will take two one at night and one in the morning. So I took a shower after hiking Bryce Canyon all day and then one before we left to go hike Zion. The drive from Bryce Canyon to Zion was only about an hour and a half. We left Bryce Canyon at 8 and planned to be on the trail in Zion around 10:30...Haha jokes on us. See we had heard mention of this news story about how the parks in Utah have been especially crowded this year because of a huge ad campaign Utah has been doing to promote their parks...well someone...not naming any names had the idea that it was just because that news story had aired on Memorial Day weekend and the park was only crowded because it was a holiday weekend.
We arrived in Zion around 10am and there was absolutely no where to park. Zion runs a shuttle system and most trails are only accessible by the shuttle. So basically you have to get to the park, find a place to park, and then ride the shuttle where ever you want to go. Its a great system in theory because it helps protect and preserve the park, but parking is a nightmare. We were camping in the park last night, but they wouldn't let us check into the campsite until 12:00pm. So we had to go drive around the pea sized down of Springdale, UT for roughly an hour before driving back to the park entrance and sitting in line for 30 minutes to get back into the park. But hey it did give me a chance to find WIFI and post pics!
We did finally get to our campsite and were able to park the car and walk to catch the shuttle, but as we were walking through the visitor center parking lot people were stopping us to ask if were leaving and if they could have our parking spot. Once we made it over to the visitor center it was at least a 25 minute line to get on the shuttle, but while standing in line, I saw The Kickliters and The Blacks. Nothing like bumping into your 6th grade science teacher while hanging out in Utah. We would have loved to talk to them longer, but the shuttle line was moving and we didn't want to lose our spot.
After riding for at least 20 minutes we made it to the trailhead to hike the Narrows. Basically it is a slot canyon that the Virgin River runs through. You can hike as far up as you want, but you are hiking 85% of the time in the river. It was cold, but not too cold and the deepest it got was up to my belly button. We hiked about four miles up and then turned around to come back down.
We finally made it back to the campsite around 6:30 last night and quickly changed clothes to go to town for dinner and when we tried to start the car it was DEAD! After getting a jump off and a nice chat with a guy from Arizona, he informed us that the heat will zap a battery in no time (and Yes we had checked to make sure nothing was left on). We did get slightly concerned since we had planned to drive through Death Valley today and after a quick phone call with Corey we drove 30 minutes out of town to the closets O'Reilly's. We got there 20 minutes before they closed, and the lady assistant manger checked our battery. She told us that it for sure needed to be changed and sold us a new one. But she had many customers and couldn't help us put it on. Of course Daniel and I neither one have ever changed a car battery, but off we went with our vauge instructions. I have to say Daniel did a marvelous job changing the car battery for his first time, and I did an excellent job supervising that process. I'm not saying that I could change one on my own, but I def. learned a lot. We finally ate dinner around 9pm last night (which just remember was 11 at home) but we did miss the nightly ranger program in our campground.
My early bird husband has been waking up a 6am every morning. He told me when we started this trip that he wanted to get an early start on most days...but of course I'm not a morning person....never fear though I sleep in the car 75% of the time. Also it is really hard to sleep in a campground past 7am. Most people are up and moving around by 7 and it starts to get loud. This morning will packing up our camp we were able to see a Falcon that had landed on the car of a neighboring campsite. We left Zion around 7:30am and started our journey toward Death Valley. The drive to Death Valley was approximately 4 hours and we got to drive through Las Vegas. Obviously we didn't drive down on the strip, but we as much as we could from the interstate. In the words of Daniel it literally is a city in the middle of nowhere.
I'm not quite sure how to describe Death Valley it could quite literally be the valley of death. Their entire park newsletter just warns you of all the dangers in and around the park. It also encourages everyone to only go out after dark. I got out of the car a couple times to take pictures and it was so hot...even the wind was hot. When we made it to the visitors center their temperature gage was measuring 103 degrees. Death Valley is huge....it is the biggest of all the National Parks, but I didn't realize how big it was until we drove all the way across it today. At one point a sign said the turn the AC in your car off for the next 20 miles to avoid your car overheating....of course with us being rule followers we did exactly what the sign told us to do, we didn't want to risk being stuck in the middle of the desert with no cell service. Daniel is convinced that if a sign told us to get naked because it might help us in some way that we would do it, just because we are rule followers. Once we left the park we still drove for about 2 hours before we ever reached civilization. When you think of California you think of all the big cities and lots of people, or at least I do.
Well I saw a side of California today that I didn't know existed. It was just baron for miles and miles and interestingly enough the closer we got to civilization the more farms we saw. I'm pretty sure I have seen everything the grow in California....grapes, olives, oranges, corn, almonds ( I had never seen an almond tree until today), if you can grow it California then I saw the farm today. OH and I got to eat at an In and Out Burger today! The burger was alright, but the fries animal style were pretty darn good! We are staying in a hotel a hour-ish outside of Sequoia tonight. I showered as soon as I got here and will shower tomorrow before we leave, and I am currently doing some laundry. Once we leave here we will be in National Parks until next Thursday, not sure if I will have access to any WIFI between now and then. If I do then I will update, if not it will be once we get to San Francisco.
We arrived in Zion around 10am and there was absolutely no where to park. Zion runs a shuttle system and most trails are only accessible by the shuttle. So basically you have to get to the park, find a place to park, and then ride the shuttle where ever you want to go. Its a great system in theory because it helps protect and preserve the park, but parking is a nightmare. We were camping in the park last night, but they wouldn't let us check into the campsite until 12:00pm. So we had to go drive around the pea sized down of Springdale, UT for roughly an hour before driving back to the park entrance and sitting in line for 30 minutes to get back into the park. But hey it did give me a chance to find WIFI and post pics!
We did finally get to our campsite and were able to park the car and walk to catch the shuttle, but as we were walking through the visitor center parking lot people were stopping us to ask if were leaving and if they could have our parking spot. Once we made it over to the visitor center it was at least a 25 minute line to get on the shuttle, but while standing in line, I saw The Kickliters and The Blacks. Nothing like bumping into your 6th grade science teacher while hanging out in Utah. We would have loved to talk to them longer, but the shuttle line was moving and we didn't want to lose our spot.
After riding for at least 20 minutes we made it to the trailhead to hike the Narrows. Basically it is a slot canyon that the Virgin River runs through. You can hike as far up as you want, but you are hiking 85% of the time in the river. It was cold, but not too cold and the deepest it got was up to my belly button. We hiked about four miles up and then turned around to come back down.
My early bird husband has been waking up a 6am every morning. He told me when we started this trip that he wanted to get an early start on most days...but of course I'm not a morning person....never fear though I sleep in the car 75% of the time. Also it is really hard to sleep in a campground past 7am. Most people are up and moving around by 7 and it starts to get loud. This morning will packing up our camp we were able to see a Falcon that had landed on the car of a neighboring campsite. We left Zion around 7:30am and started our journey toward Death Valley. The drive to Death Valley was approximately 4 hours and we got to drive through Las Vegas. Obviously we didn't drive down on the strip, but we as much as we could from the interstate. In the words of Daniel it literally is a city in the middle of nowhere.
I'm not quite sure how to describe Death Valley it could quite literally be the valley of death. Their entire park newsletter just warns you of all the dangers in and around the park. It also encourages everyone to only go out after dark. I got out of the car a couple times to take pictures and it was so hot...even the wind was hot. When we made it to the visitors center their temperature gage was measuring 103 degrees. Death Valley is huge....it is the biggest of all the National Parks, but I didn't realize how big it was until we drove all the way across it today. At one point a sign said the turn the AC in your car off for the next 20 miles to avoid your car overheating....of course with us being rule followers we did exactly what the sign told us to do, we didn't want to risk being stuck in the middle of the desert with no cell service. Daniel is convinced that if a sign told us to get naked because it might help us in some way that we would do it, just because we are rule followers. Once we left the park we still drove for about 2 hours before we ever reached civilization. When you think of California you think of all the big cities and lots of people, or at least I do.
Well I saw a side of California today that I didn't know existed. It was just baron for miles and miles and interestingly enough the closer we got to civilization the more farms we saw. I'm pretty sure I have seen everything the grow in California....grapes, olives, oranges, corn, almonds ( I had never seen an almond tree until today), if you can grow it California then I saw the farm today. OH and I got to eat at an In and Out Burger today! The burger was alright, but the fries animal style were pretty darn good! We are staying in a hotel a hour-ish outside of Sequoia tonight. I showered as soon as I got here and will shower tomorrow before we leave, and I am currently doing some laundry. Once we leave here we will be in National Parks until next Thursday, not sure if I will have access to any WIFI between now and then. If I do then I will update, if not it will be once we get to San Francisco.
Glad there are other rule followers in the world beside my husband....the naked sign comment was hilarious and I truly hope all car trouble is out of the way:)
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