Sunday, October 25, 2015 (Zion River Resort, Virgin, UT)

Today we thought we'd explore a different part of Zion National Park...so about 10:30 we headed off to the northwest corner of the park. Kolob canyons is located off I-15 about 10 miles north once back to the Interstate. We started off at the Visitors Center.



After showing our 7-day park pass, we started off on the five mile scenic drive that ends at the Kolob Canyons Viewpoint. The drive climbs past the spectacular canyons and red rocks of the Kolob Canyons.




At the viewpoint, we took in the view and then decided to walk the short Timber Creek Overlook Trail...rated as moderate and described as "Follows a ridge on a small peak with views of Timber Creek, Kolob Terrace and Pine Valley Mountains." Now, it says that it is only 1 mile round trip but quite honestly, we think they got that wrong...it's more like one mile each way.
A cool path...looks like a bunch of sand boxes all lined up...

 Pretty spectacular views!



After our hike, we headed back down the scenic drive...stopping at some of the viewpoints along the way.















Then it was time for another hike...a little longer than the last one. Taylor Creek Trail...rated as moderate and follows the middle fork of Taylor Creek to Double Arch Alcove...

The trail starts with quite a decent into the valley...


















 Larson Cabin Circa 1930











Some kind of mushrooms...


 Fife Cabin Circa 1930









 And finally, we made it!
Double Arch Alcove...




 After about a ten minute break...along with lots of pictures, it was time to head back...

















 Look at the folds in these layers of rock...
 I slipped off the rock crossing the creek and ended up with two wet feet! Oops...





We were happy to see the stairs leading back up to the parking lot...yay, we're back! It took us about one hour, 45 minutes to make it to the Double Arch alcove...and one hour, fifteen minutes back. On the way back, we thought it would be fun to count the number of times we crossed the creek...54 times! We were tired...and I had two wet feet!

On the way back to the RV Park, we stopped in Hurricane and fueled up with diesel...$2.37/gallon. It was going on 5:00 by the time we got home....we'd had another great day! 

Well, that's it for our hiking in Zion National Park. We have gone hiking five days in a row and we figure we have hiked about 26 miles...and most of it was up and down hill! Zion National Park is absolutely beautiful! We'll have to come back again...we still have more trails to hike!



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