Zion National Park...and snow?

Our first destination was Zion National Park in southern Utah. It's such a beautiful place, it's no surprise that it's one of the most visited national parks.

Our first morning, we hopped aboard the shuttle and hiked the Kayenta trail. Right after crossing the bridge, a deer ran thru the river and stopped in front of us for a couple minutes before continuing his run upstream. Here's a picture of him-

Here's a few pictures from our hike. Somehow the kids managed to snag hiking sticks from a couple on the trail.

 We played at the river's edge for awhile. Asher LOVES throwing rocks, so he could have stayed all day. Luckily I found the river runs right behind our campground, so we spent lots of time there playing with rocks and caterpillars.

 As we were eating dinner, I asked the kids what their favorite part was....and they said "the bus" (shuttle), ah, of course. Ha!

Journey was winking at the guy behind us....Oh boy!

Ragnar @Zion- the 120mile trail race....to the extreme! 

We went to watch Daddy compete in the Ragnar as part of an 8 person team. The runners all tent camp in an area referred to as "the village" and the race runs around the clock for a day and a half. The kids and I had planned to camp with Daddy, until a friend talked us out of it. And yah..... here's his tent!

The temp dropped below freezing and SIX inches of snow fell on them (they were at a much higher altitude than our campground)! This actually made the race, part of which was on a very narrow cliff, extremely dangerous and that morning they ended up canceling the race and actually calling in search and rescue for help locating missing runners. One of which was our friend, Tom. His 8 mile run started at 4:30am and would normally take a little over 2 hours; he was gone for 4 hours! They feared the worst, but turns out he was helping other runners who wanted to give up and would have needed rescued. Keep in mind they were wearing running clothes, no coats or anything, so hypothermia was a serious concern! Eventually all of the runners were accounted for and everyone headed home for hot showers!

For once in 3 years of driving to Zion, the kids were actually awake as we approached Fort Zion, so we pulled in and explored their little town, fed the animals and posed for photos.