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Grand Staircase: Zion - Day 7
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Zion National Park - Observation Point
It was raining when we last visited Zion
20 years ago, and we weren't able to do the hike that we had planned (Angel's
Landing) because it went up to a viewpoint along an exposed cliff, so we
thought we’d give it another try this time. However, we also wanted to do
Observation Point, which had to be done on a weekend because that trail was
closed for maintenance during the weekdays and we arrived on a Sunday, so we
did the Observation Point hike first on Sunday, even though the weather
forecast was calling for several days of rain starting Monday morning.
Mo envies the “tag along rider” on this
Harley motorcycle that she spied in the Zion Lodge parking lot before heading
to the Observation Point trailhead.
Just getting started on our hike to
Observation Point and we are already stopping to take in the views. The rock
outcrop at the big bend in the road is called The Organ, and the bump behind
and slightly to the left of it (just before the photo starts to wash out) is
Angel’s Landing, which we hiked the next day. If you look close, you can see
the Virgin River winding it’s
way through the canyon along the big bend, the origin of which is The Narrows
in the northern part of the park – one of the most popular and well known slot
canyons. This river actually flooded the park after heavy rains 2 days later
but we managed to leave early that morning just before the park road closed.
However, those same rains also washed out a significant portion of I-25, the
main route to Las Vegas, forcing us to take a long detour to reach the airport
for our flight back to New Jersey.
Views from the top of
Observation Point.
The plateau just behind the
razor like rock in the middle of the photo below is Angel’s Landing, a much
better perspective than the one at the beginning of the trail.
On the way back down from Observation
Point, we took a side trail to Hidden Canyon where Mo found all kinds of
treasures. First there was the neat looking slanted arch,
and then she got mischievous
and “cheated” on Li with his “rock cousin” (he wears the same hiking cap as Li),
until he buckled under the
pressure and fell to pieces, at which point all the king’s horses and all the
king’s men couldn’t put him back together again!
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