One of the must do things on our list was to explore in Zion National Park. Kevin and I had loved our last visit there and wanted to share that with the boys.
We did three different trails. The first one was the Archaeological Trail right near the visitor center. It wasn’t much and the boys weren’t impressed. I don’t think we even went all the way to the end.
We did hike really close to a couple of deer though. And the boys saw some lizards … they weren’t successful at catching them though.
The boys enjoyed the bus ride through Zion almost as much as the hikes. Not because they enjoyed what the tour guide was saying, but because they were riding a BUS!
Bobby just liked the breaks from being in the back pack!
There are oodles and oodles of rock formations to look at in Zions. I was pointing one particular one out to Rusty. I thought he might like it because it looked exactly like a beehive. He looked at it and excitedly said, “It looks like a pancake!”
Sometimes you had to wait for the next bus. Sometimes taking selfies entertains better than rock formations.
Sometimes taking selfies doesn’t work well when holding a baby.
Sometimes you get really cute ones!
We decided to get the boys all their own Camel Bak to carry on the hikes. These are those backpacks with water pouches in them and you suck through a straw to get the water out. Sort of a hands-free hydration. We thought it would help the boys drink more. We were right in regards to Rusty and Tommy. I spent a lot of time telling them to take the straw out of their mouths. And every chance we had, we had to refill their packs. Of course, this also meant a lot of pit stops.
At one stop, while I was gone, Kevin was bombarded by Italian men. They were very impressed with Kevin’s wealth … five sons! Kevin was a bit leery about them though and didn’t let them hold Bobby.
This same stop was where a group of Asians couldn’t get enough of Bobby. One lady kept circling us and talking to us and you could tell that she really wanted to hold him but wasn’t brave enough to ask. Again, we didn’t offer.
The boys were sure that something cool lived in the hole of this tree. They couldn’t see it, but they were sure it was there somewhere.
The next hike definitely impressed the boys. We went to the Lower Emerald Pool. We’d have gone on to the Upper Emerald Pool, but that part of the trail was supposed to be steep and we were lugging Bobby around in a backpack.
Remember all those pit stops I mentioned? On our hike to the Emerald Pools, Rusty and Tommy had seriously full bladders. Repeatedly. Unfortunately, my boys are not trained to use nature as their restroom. It took a lot of coaxing and a few tears, but they were able to do it. Several times. Much to my chagrin. But at least there were no accidents.
And Ricky and Billy got to do some exploring while we waited.
Bobby weighs a lot in this back pack. Just sayin’.
At the lower pool there were a few “waterfalls.” They were more like water mists coming down the mountain, but they were beautiful and fun to get wet in. Because they were more of a mist, they sometimes didn’t drop much on you and then suddenly you were being poured on! It was a lot of fun and we giggled as we got soaked. It was such a hot day that it felt just delightful!
Rusty liked trying to catch water in his mouth.
Waiting for the next pouring to happen …
After a nice lunch on the lawn by the Zion Lodge (and a good rest for Kevin’s back from carrying Bobby), Tommy looked over at Bobby’s bare feet and said, “Bobby is wearing tanned feet!”
That’s when we started on our final hike of the day. It is the last hike in that part of the park … the hike that leads to the Narrows.
Squirrels are very abundant on this trail and very much not afraid of people. Although they might be a bit camera shy!
Once you reach the end of that trail, you are at the Virgin River and the mouth of the Narrows Canyon. We weren’t planning to go very far up the canyon, but you can’t resist the cool water and the fun of hiking in a river.
The boys had seen others with hiking staffs, and so they found sticks throughout the day to use on the hikes. They actually came in handy for them at the Narrows.
We’d done some preliminary hiking to help prepare the boys for the park. And it paid off. They were fantastic hikers. I don’t remember any whining, even when Tommy was so tired by the end of the day!
It was just such a neat day together. Everything that I was hoping for!
As we hiked through the water down the canyon, we ran into some of the rest of the Pendleton family. They had come into the park after us and gone a lot farther up the Narrows than we were going. We saw them on their way back down. That was a pleasant surprise!
The only bad part of the day came at the very end. We had done our hikes, been to every restroom in the park (it felt like), checked out the visitor’s center for souvenirs, and were about to get into the car to head back to the vacation house. And, mean mom that I am, I wouldn’t let the boys bring their walking sticks back with them. I made them leave the sticks there for some other little boys to use. Oh, the tears. Sigh. But we did take a picture to remember them by.
The restroom fun didn’t end just because we’d left the park. The vacation house was only 45 minutes away and we stopped FIVE times to use the restroom. All required stops, not just flukes. Those two little boys were just swimming in water. They’d empty their bladder and it would just fill right back up again.
If it hadn’t been such a good day and if it wasn’t so darn funny, it might have bothered me.
But it was just a funny end to a really great day!