This morning, I woke up in the Wal-Mart parking lot in Cedar City, UT and drove about an hour and a half to the visitor center in Zion National Park. The park has an unique and efficient transportation system in which most of the park can only be accessed through National Park-operated shuttles. There are plenty of parking spaces concentrated near the visitor center and in the small, tourist down immediately outside the National park. At 15 minute intervals, these shuttles transport visitors between the different shuttle stops. The benefits of this system are that traffic is greatly reduced, there is less need for huge parking lots in the middle of the beautiful areas of the park, and one-way hikes become much more convenient.
At the suggestion of a ranger at the visitor center, I hiked the following hikes:
- Observation Point Trail from Weeping Rock Trailhead including a side-trail to access Hidden Canyon (10 miles roundtrip)
- West Rim Trail from The Grotto Trailhead, AKA Angel’s Landing (5.5 miles roundtrip)
- Kayenta Trail and Emeralds Pool Trail from The Grotto Trailhead (4 miles total)
Because I started the Observation Point Trail at the late time of 9AM, and also because of the large amounts of mileage I’ve been hiking over the past week, I doubted that I would be able to hike 20 miles today. My doubts became even stronger as the first four miles of the Observation Point Trail and the first three miles of the Angels Landing hike had a lot of elevation gain. Fortunately, I was able to hike the entire 20 miles and still felt great afterwards without any soreness or pain. This might have been because of the thin barefoot-like shoes I’ve been wearing (rather than cushioned running shoes or hiking shoes) or it could have been that I was enjoying the scenery so much that I didn’t have time to focus on my legs and the work/pain they were going through.
On the way down from observation point, I took the side trail to hidden Canyon. Hidden Canyon is a relatively easy canyon but still requires some bouldering and cautious climbing. About 15 minutes into the canyon there is small arch along the canyon walls. At this point, I turn back and met back up with the observation point trail down to the trailhead.
After finishing the first hike, I took the shuttle bus one stop over to the grotto trailhead. From there I took the west rim Trail which followed the river before steeply ascending via many switchbacks. These switchbacks were particularly difficult in the 90 degree desert weather. Earlier in the day, I made the questionable decision of wearing a long sleeve shorts sweatshirt for the day. My justification was that this would relieve me from having to wear sunscreen on my arms. I regretted this decision throughout most of the day but stubbornly continued wearing my sweatshirt. A couple of miles into the Angels Landing hike, the conventional hike ends and the portion of the hike with metal handrails and cables begins. At first I was very cautious and concerned because the trail was being simultaneously used by both those going up and coming down, which was concerning due to the narrow and steep trail. At one point I was particularly scared as I realized I was on the wrong side of the railing close to a cliff drop. Besides that, I didn’t realize that I passed the warned-about 2 to 3 feet wide portion until I was already at the top. Unlike hiking on flat terrain, when I was hiking on Angels Landing my mind couldn’t wander to mundane matters because I was too preoccupied with the height and the beautiful 360° views of the canyon below. I haven’t had that feeling in a while but that’s probably one of the reasons people are attracted to the extreme sports or activities with a little bit of danger.
After descending from Angels Landing, I started Emerald pools trail which also began from the grotto trailhead. After a mile, the trail reached the lower pools, followed by the middle pools and finally the upper pools. The upper pools were most interesting as they were surrounded by Cliff walls thousands of feet tall. At the upper pools, there was a very weak waterfall dripping from thousands of feet overhead onto the rocks at the upper pool. I walked around the rocks around the entire upper pool and even walked under the waterfall few seconds.
The middle pool was relatively uneventful and quiet, just a small quiet pool.
The lower pool was a cliff bowl/semi arch which had a couple of waterfalls flowing down its face. After visiting the pools, I descended to the Zion Lodge, one shuttle stop over from the grotto trail. In front of the Zion lodge, there is a large grassy area with a single, large, prominent tree that invites people to relax and picnic underneath it. After a few minutes of relaxing under the tree, I caught the shuttle bus to the visitor center.
After leaving Zion national Park late in the afternoon, I headed toward Page, Arizona. Page is a resort town in northern Arizona which serves as a gateway to Lake Powell, The Grand Canyon, and many other local and regional nature attractionss. At the same time, page seems to be a hometown and base for the Navajo tribe. The Navajo tribe is the largest Native American in the United States, owning land in California, Arizona Nevada, Utah, and more.
Driving into town, I passed by the Glen Canyon dam and the visitors center. It’s an inspiring site to look at the dam’s 700 foot high, slightly-sloping concrete walls controlling the flows of the Colorado River. Especially back in the day, this was a major engineering achievement and tourist attraction. I wonder if the government regrets building some of these enormous dams due to the environmental damage and possible safety/catastrophe/terrorism possibilities. Are dams still being built today? What is the future of dams? What is the role of dams?
Continuing a few more miles south, I noticed the bank-owned Page shopping center on the left hand side. The shop space component (including the subway) is facing the highway and has great visibility. This 10,000 SF portion can probably be worth $100/SF separately. However, the anchor space provides a huge challenge/risk, especially for an out-of-state investor with no tenant in mind. Considering the $3 million asking price, there isn’t nearly enough upside potential considering the risk and current situation. Acquisition price for the entire property would need to be around $1-$1.5 million, and even for that price it would only work for a certain type of investor.
