Las Vegas and more!

Ok,  so I promised you some Zion photos, didn't I?  We spent last Wednesday and Thursday in Zion National Park in beautiful sunny weather hiking some fantastic trails.   We were immediately blown away as soon as we drove into the park.  Where else can you drive through a mile long tunnel no just through a mountain, but along the edge of it.  For one mile!

The drive in from the east

That "little" hole in the mountain was one of the windows that lit the tunnel we drove through

I had planned on doing the Narrows slot canyon trail, but was apparently unaware that in late winter/spring months the trail consists of wading and/or swimming through chest deep water that is currently 47 degrees.  So, we didn't do that trail.  But we did hike up to Angel Landing on Wednesday and also up the Riverside walk to check out the beginning of the Narrows trail.

The trail below

View from the top!

And here was our lovely campsite right on the river in the park:

This one's for Dad :)

The next day we hiked into Hidden Canyon to get a little bit of the Zion slot canyon experience.  It was mostly dry, but took some scrambling to get up and around some larger pools.

We also hiked into the Emerald Pools.  This was the uppermost pool:

We left Zion after our hike into the pools and had a hair-raising (for me at least) drive in to find our campsite for the night.  The scary drive was well worth it though, since we had this view all to ourselves:

We drove to Las Vegas on Friday to meet up with Sean and Danielle to get my first taste of The Strip.  Wow.  I can't even put that place into words.  We wandered up and down the strip on Friday night and I got to play with my camera in all the shiny lights:

On Saturday we drove out to Hoover Dam, driving over the dam on the old road:

New bridge!

Lake Mead

We headed out to Red Rock Canyon on Sunday and it was gorgeous!  It may just have saved my climbing career.  We had a beautiful day of climbing with no scary falls or scrapes or anything!  Just what I needed.

And finally, we drove through Death Valley today:

Zabriskie Point

Devil's Golf course

I could have used a couple more second on the timer!

Lowest Point in North America!

And here's me covered in salt from kneeling down to lick the salt flats.

We're now in Ridgecrest, Ca catching up with our awesome friend Anna-Maria.  In the morning we'll head up to Sequoia National Park and then Yosemite after that.  Keep your fingers crossed that we keep our warm weather for a little while longer!