And More Hiking at Zion

The above picture was the front windshield of a big Class A parked across from us. It looked like they had a mural painted on it but it was just the mountains reflected on the glass.

We are still finding new trails to hike here. Took the shuttle on Tuesday to the lodge and did the Emerald Pools hike. There are three different levels of waterfalls and pools. Last year we just took a stroll to the lower pool,so this year we did the entire trail. They call them emerald pools because of all the green algae. You could walk under the lower falls.

 

The middle pool.

    

The upper pool and a view on the way back down.

Yesterday we decided to see some different scenery and drove back through the tunnel to the east entrance to the park. At the ranger talk the other night, he said there were quite a few big horn sheep born this spring, and the best place to see them was on the east side of the park. We hiked about two to three miles along the East Rim trail, but didn’t see any sheep.

 

It was a gradual climb up to good views of Checkerboard Mesa and finally to Jolley Gulch. If you continue on, in about 7 more miles you would get to Observation Point.

 

Since it has been such a wet winter and spring, there was a nice waterfall.

It was a good trail and an opportunity to see the other side of Zion, which is totally different from the canyon. By the end of our hike, Jim was having red rock withdrawal symptoms, and was happy to get back through the tunnel and see this again.