Snow Canyon State Park

In this part of southwest Utah where we have been for weeks, the scenery can be summarized by, “There is a lot of red rock” (actually, rust colored). That sounds like it might get boring after a while. but the variations on the theme are endless and amazing.

The National Parks in the area featuring the red rocks are very, very famous and as a result, very, very crowded. For example, Zion and Bryce. But there are also so many other places that are almost (if not as) wonderful, and nowhere near as crowded.

One of them is Snow Canyon State Park, near Saint George, where we spent about a week.

And just for the record, the place is named after Lorenzo and Erastus Snow, two early Mormon pioneers who helped Mormons settle in Utah in the 1860’s. Not after that cold fluffy white stuff which would not have lasted long in the over 100 degree temps we experienced when we were there.

Snow Canyon not only features the famous layers of red rock but also has a lot of black rock from old volcanic lava flows.

A lava cave

We hiked on petrified sand dunes,

Rented eBikes (1,000 foot elevation gain was too much for us on our regular bikes) and rode the road and bike trails, 

 met some of the locals,

and saw so many amazing views -

And it was so hot, that I even tried boiling water …

Zion National Park - Part 1

This is not my first time in Zion National Park.

The first time I came to Zion was over 45 years ago. It was only the second National Park I had ever been to, having been to Yosemite a week earlier.

I was by myself - I had been in California for a two-week vacation with a friend, and I extended my trip for another week to see Zion, Bryce, and the Grand Canyon while she flew back to NY.

The second time I came here was two years later, this time with my sister. It was part of a three-week, five National Park spree.

Fast forward a few years and I came with Bob and our 3 boys.

Then 16 years ago, Bob and I were here in the winter. Words cannot describe the beauty of white snow on red rock.

And finally, we were back in Zion last week.

The park is enormous, but the most visited section is Zion Canyon, carved by the Virgin River. We were in that part of the park for six days. We’ll be back for some of the rest later.

The views never get old. They change with the lighting, the time of day, the weather, and the season. You can sit in one spot all day and watch the view change minute by minute.

We went biking. We loaded our bikes on the shuttle bus, got off at the last stop, and biked down to the start, all downhill, stopping a million times on the way down to take pictures.

A campsite with a view.

"Snowing" Cottonwood Fluff in Zion National Park

Lill and Bob’s Excellent RV Adventures, New Edition

Lill and Bob’s Excellent RV Adventures, New Edition

It’s been a while. A very long while…

I never got around to blogging about last spring/summer’s 3 month trip to Newfoundland with some Labrador, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick squeezed in.

Nor did I blog about our 3 week trip this past winter to Panama. (No, we did not drive in our RV.) It was our first time on an airplane in about 6 years. It was very, very annoying having to pack suitcases, then unpack them, and lug them around to all the places we went to.

But now we are traveling in our RV again! And I will try to blog this trip.

To catch up, Wed April 30th, a little over two weeks ago we left New Jersey and headed west. 4 of the first 8 days were long slogs of driving about 500 miles each day, with a lovely Shabbos in Kansas City, KS, and a day in gorgeous Colorado National Monument before getting to our first destination of Zion National Park last Wednesday. 

Here are some pictures from the first week:

After driving for 2 days, we make it to Gokul, our favorite Indian restaurant, for dinner. In St Louis, 950 miles from home. I asked the owner to please open a restaurant in NJ and he told me that his Jewish customers from all over ask him that.

Spent a lovely Shabbos in Kansas City

We took a picture from almost this exact same spot overlooking Dillon Reservoir off of Rt 10 in Colorado 4 years ago. There was a lot more snow then.

Colorado National Monument, less than a week after we left home.

The first week