Zion National Park

As we were leaving the city campground, a local told us why Zion was so crowded so late in the season--the schools were closed for Fall Break! Everyone was taking the chance to spend on last long weekend at Zion. Thursday and Friday were school holidays (we arrived Thursday evening).

Once set up in South Campground at Zion, we drove around the area getting some geocaches as we knew the park would be too crowded. We found some 4 years ago, but more have been hidden!

Our first cache was at a small city park in Springdale. There is a picnic area on one side of the bridge and a dog park on the other side.

Then it was on to Grafton, the ghost town made famous by the movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. You'll have to look at our old blog for pictures as the place was crowded this time! Then it was on to the graveyard to find the Butch and Sundance Cache behind the fence. Bob went to the upper trail looking and I climbed the hill below. The cache was in the rocks just above my head. Only we don't get credit for finding it because as we were looking we kept saying this looked familiar---we found it the last time we were there!

After finding a few more caches, we returned to the park and had to wait in line to get through the gate! We stayed in the rv until late in the afternoon then we decided to hike Watchman Trail. Maybe it wouldn't be crowded late in the day. The trail starts across from the campground and goes to a lookout area just below the ridge. This is a look back down the trail as we were going to the top.

 We stopped for a rest at this retaining wall.

Did I mention that it was warm at Zion? Well, since we had come down in elevation, the temperatures were higher. This day it hit the low 80's. We were used to hiking in cooler temperatures! This corner of the trail offered cool temps. It was in the shade and there was a small stream coming down in the corner.

 We made it to the top and had a great view of Zion!

 After we hiked down, we looked back to the overlook, the rocks jutting off the side and saw the moon just overhead.

 We enjoyed our day, but not the crowds. Hmmmm, what to do on Saturday when you know it will be crowded again?