Honeymoon Day 8: The Narrows at Zion National Park

We woke up before the sun and made a quick campfire so we could make ourselves a good breakfast. Then we hurried over to the shuttle stop and caught a nice early shuttle to the area where The Narrows start. We put on all of our rental gear which included some waterproof pants (they just go over your regular pants, and they have these rubber gaskets at the ankles to keep water from getting to your pants/skin), some neoprene socks to keep your feet warm (they definitely still get very wet), and some shoes that are specially made for hiking on the slippery and pointy rocks in the water. We also each rented a hiking stick, which is very necessary for finding where there were drop-offs in the water or where there were huge rocks, and it also helped for preparing for how deep the water was going to be for certain areas.

We hiked The Narrows for about 5 hours, and WOW was it tough. It was so beautiful and amazing, and such a cool experience. We're really glad we did it, but it was incredibly tough. For the way up The Narrows you're fighting the current the whole way so your legs are getting pretty exhausted, and then on the way back you're having to fight to make sure the current doesn't take you too fast so you lose your footing and fall. The water was COLD, so we were very thankful for our waterproof pants!!

Wahoo!

Some areas just had water depths that were to mid-calf, but others got to mid or upper thigh 

A waterfall

If you looks closely on this one, you can kinda see the strength of the current! The water was really moving the whole time, even though in a lot of pictures it looks pretty still. 

 We were SO exhausted after The Narrows! We both felt a bit beat up from all of the rocks and everything, and we both had sore knees and ankles (I think I twisted my one ankle like 8 times... haha). After we finished, we took the shuttle back to the our campground, and then got in our car to drive into town to return the rental equipment and we also got some coffee and a snack at a little coffee shop. We had decided that it would be better to stay in the Zion Lodge that night rather than camp, because it would be easier for our flight day to not have to break camp and try to get everything organized in our luggage. So we broke camp, checked in at the lodge, and took our time getting packed for our flight the next day. We had dinner at the Lodge too, which was lovely!

There were 3 deer hanging out at the Lodge! They had NO fear of people, and were just chowing down on the grass while people walked by. 

And on Day 9, we drove to the Las Vegas Airport and took our flight back to Philly!!  It was an AMAZING honeymoon, and we both can't wait to go back to some of the spots we saw. We're happy tot be back home with our house and our dear Guinness though!!

Honeymoon Day 7: Zion National Park

We had set our alarms for around 7am on Day 7, because we did NOT want to miss the sunrise at Bryce Canyon! We were like a 5 minute walk from Sunrise Point, so we figured that was probably a great place to watch the sunrise. The weather was perfect (it was a little chilly, but nothing our jackets couldn't fix!), and the sunrise was AMAZING.

 After we watched the sunrise, we packed up all of our stuff into our car, and we started our drive to Zion (and had Cheerios in the car for breakfast). We accidentally went in the back entrance of Zion National Park, which meant that we had a looooooong crazy drive (including a super long tunnel that was over a mile long and only one direction of cars could go through at a time!) until we got to the front of the park where the Visitor Center, campground, etc was located. We went to our campsite and set up our tent, etc, and we made lunch (mac-n-cheese and hot dogs) and we had to eat in our car because there were a ton of wasps!

After we finished our lunch, we walked over to the Visitor Center to get advice on some trails. And because Zion is such a huge and popular park, you have to take the park shuttle to get anywhere! To be honest, when we first got to Zion we weren't loving it... It just felt SO busy and crowded, and the whole idea of needing to take a shuttle everywhere really felt like an amusement park or something instead of a national park. So, we were trying REALLY hard to have an open mind and a positive outlook about Zion, but it definitely wasn't love at first sight. Anyways, back to our day: After talking to the ranger at the Visitor Center, we took the park shuttle over to The Grotto, and then started the Kayenta Trail to the Lower and Upper Emerald Pools. The hike to the Lower Emerald Pools was beautiful and easy, but the hike to the Upper Emerald Pools was pretty darn tough!

The Upper Emerald Pools! 

Upper Emerald Pools! You can see how the water is running down the side of that mountain into the pool... 

Here's a little waterfall we had to walk under on our hike back.

Lower Emerald Pools

 The hike ended back at the Zion Lodge, where we caught another shuttle back to our campground. When we got to our campsite, we hopped into our car to drive into the nearby town to pick up our rental gear to hike The Narrows the next day. The rental facility also had us watch a safety video for hiking The Narrows, and that was very useful and informative! We ate dinner at a Mexican restaurant in town, and then headed back to our campsite where we enjoyed our campfire for the rest of the evening. We toasted some marshmallows for dessert, and went to bed decently early so we could get a nice early start the next morning. Oh, and I should mention: Day 7 was our first day without rain!! So that was pretty lovely :)  

This is a picture I took while we were at a gas station in town. Can you imagine having these views from your local gas station??  Crazy... 

This is a view of the moon and a mountain from our campsite! We were sitting by our campfire just enjoying the scenery. It was gorgeous. 

Just having fun in front of our campfire! 

Honeymoon Day 6: Bryce Canyon National Park

We had a nice leisurely morning at Capitol Reef National Park and made breakfast over the campfire (yay for something other than Cheerios!), and then we packed our tent, etc into our car and drove to Bryce Canyon! Our first stop at Bryce was the Visitor Center for trail advice, and then we drove to the Bryce Canyon Lodge for a nice lunch before we started hiking! Over lunch we were continuing to look at the Trail Map, and we made a nice plan for a good hike. We decided to start at Sunrise Point and do the Queens Garden Hike combined with the Navajo Loop, which brought us out at Sunset Point... so then we just had the gorgeous flat walk back to Sunrise Loop all along the rim of the canyon. It was a GREAT hike, but the end was quite exhausting because it was uphill and it was starting to rain which made it very slippery and muddy! All of the scenery on the hike was so amazing though, and I think this might have been my favorite of all of the National Parks we saw! Everything just looked so darn cool and beautiful, and Bryce Canyon is known for its rock formations called hoodoos, and I think they're super cool.

There were a few of these little man-made archways we had to walk through on our hike

This is Thor's Hammer! It's the hoodoo formation sticking up in the center of the picture. 

Here's a closer picture of Thor's Hammer! 

We're laughing at how bad I am at taking selfies! 

After we finished our hike, we stopped by the gift shop that was near where we'd parked our car, and we got a few local beers to drink outside on the patio! It was so relaxing and a great way to recuperate after our hike. After we'd rested a bit, we went to check into our ADORABLE cabin. I really couldn't get over how cute it was, and I really think I could live in a cabin like that for the rest of my life (if it had a kitchen of some sort...). We both took showers (they were BADLY needed by this point... we were disgusting), and then we relaxed until dinner time. We had dinner back at the Bryce Canyon Lodge, and it was so amazing. I had a nice glass of wine and a steak, and McGee had some local beer and fish (Mahi). 

Our beers! Mine was called HooDoo beer (and that's Thor's Hammer on its label).

Our ADORABLE cabin!!! We loved it, and it was right inside the park. It was just a few minute walk to the Lodge. 

The ceiling in our cute little cabin! It was amazing.

This was our cabin! I probably should have taken a picture before we had our stuff everywhere messing it up! But we totally fired up that little fireplace in the corner later that evening. 

This was the fireplace in the Bryce Canyon Lodge! I loved it so much. 

After our stomachs were super full, we walked back to our ADORABLE cabin and relaxed for the rest of the night! We had a nice fire in the fireplace and we also had our heater on - I'm SO glad we didn't camp at Bryce Canyon because it's the coldest of the National Parks we went to (due to its high elevation). We were nice and toasty warm and comfortable, and we loved Bryce Canyon!