Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Day 14 - Zion National Park

Day 14 (June 8) -- So finally a day for us to catch our breath!  It's hard when we have to move camps so often!  This morning we were awake early (so hard to sleep in when we are in a tent.  There are always loud birds, loud neighbors, and the pesky sunlight!  This morning there were park rangers who decided to use a chainsaw first thing in the morning.  It's a little hard to sleep through that much noise!  Erin was the only one who stayed asleep (or at least faked sleeping).  Since we couldn't shower, we just got up, dressed, and went to a buffet for breakfast.  Erin ate them out of strawberries and Daniel ate them out of bacon.  A buffet is always a good option with teenagers!

Zion National Park
After breakfast we headed up the scenic drive on the shuttle bus.  We got off at Zion Lodge and walked across the street to the horse corral for our afternoon ride.  We all got assigned horses based on our riding ability and skill.  I got a pigeon-toed quarter horse (who looked like an Appy) named Pepper.  He was pretty good and kept up well.  Erin and Jaeyong also got horses, but David and Daniel got mules (too funny).  They had whips which were awesome (made from a length of rubber hose with a leather handle on one end and leather tassels on the other end.  The guy leading our ride was a rodeo rider (bull-rider and saddle-bronc).  He was just waiting for the season to start.  He also broke colts in his spare time.  It was fun to watch him try to explain things to me (I was the only one who could hear him because I was second in line).  All of his horse/wilderness trivia I already knew.  He would try to show me tricks on his horse and I'd tell him about even more elaborate tricks I'd done as a kid.  He finally gave up trying to teach me stuff and just let me help lead the group and we talked about horse preferences (he doesn't like Paints or Appaloosas -- says the only reason the Indians rode them was because they were slow enough for the Indians to catch them on foot).  I disagreed, but we still got on okay.  He did have one joke that was funny -- "What's the difference between in-laws and outlaws?"  Answer -- "Outlaws are wanted."  Ha ha!
 



 



After our ride we went back to the Lodge, shopped a bit, rested, and at an early dinner.  Then we rode the shuttle to the end of the route and walked the Riverwalk trail which leads to the entrance of the Narrows.  I have such fond memories of hiking the Narrows when Katlin was just a little kid.  Mom, Katlin, and I forded the Virgin River up the canyon for several miles (the Narrows trail is basically walking up the river and going from shoal to shoal within the very narrow canyon).  Katlin gamely walked up the river for a long while (she was around 5 years old at the time, so the river was almost waist deep for her) and then she got tired.  I had to carry her on my back the whole way back down the canyon. 

The kids had fun at the river skipping rocks.  Jaeyong is really good at skipping them -- he says it is similar to throwing a baseball sidearm. 

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