Westward Bound: Hiking the Narrows at Zion National Park

After leaving Bryce Canyon National Park on our summer 2012 vacation, we headed southwest toward Zion National Park, also in Utah. We knew we wouldn’t have much time there, but we wanted to see how beautiful this area was, and we wanted to walk the Narrows, a slim river-carved canyon with steep, high walls. Also, we wanted to see the world’s fattest squirrel, apparently.

The sun peeked over the mountains as we rode the shuttle at Zion.

We arrived early in the morning, getting a nice parking spot and hopping directly onto the shuttle at the visitor center. The park service converted to shuttles years ago in order to reduce the destruction that millions of annual visitors and cars were causing to the natural environment.

The air was still cool that morning, but the sun was well on the rise. Extra nice was that we were well ahead of the afternoon crowds.

View from the shuttle’s rooftop window

The shuttle took us past many of the popular hiking and viewing spots, and while we could have stopped at any of them, we had one destination in mind for this short trip: the Temple of Sinawava. This was the final shuttle stop and the location of the head of the Riverside Walk trail, which leads to the entrance of the Narrows.

The Riverside Walk trail at the Temple is quite accessible for most folks, and it’s about a mile long. As one would expect, the trail follows the Virgin River, which flowed at an easy pace during our visit.

Trickling water lets a fern-and-moss garden grow on a canyon wall along the Riverside Walk trail.

Trickling moisture on one canyon wall has created a type of hanging garden, a smaller version of a gigantic one highlighted elsewhere at Zion, the Weeping Rock.

When we got to the Narrows entrance, we didn’t hesitate, wading straight into the river. For most of the river hike, the water stayed calves-to-ankles deep. Keens or other good water shoes are necessary, and some people also use walking sticks. Be prepared to get wetter, however — in a short while, the water gets much deeper — waist-level or higher.

Just a few feet from this spot, the water reached waist-deep for some, deeper for others. My younger son chose to stay on the right side instead of moving to the left, and he ended up swimming!

Carrying a camera in the Narrows is a tricky situation. I had to seal mine in a large plastic bag, which I then placed carefully in the backpack my oldest son carried. I figured he better carry it, since I was the one more likely to accidentally take a plunge (in fact, I once broke my arm by falling in a creek and hitting a boulder — not an act I’d recommend to anyone, especially when it’s a long walk back to the parking lot. Note: My son, who is reading over my shoulder right now, laughed and said, “So you gave the camera to the one who caused you to fall and break your arm.” What a riot, haha.).

Water flowing down one of the steep cliffs

Note the large round rocks. These are typical of the rocks you will traverse in the river at the Narrows.

The water was cool but not ice cold. That means it’s pleasant to walk through, but it’s quite a chill thrill when it gets deep enough to reach your more delicate areas. Periodically we could hear folks screaming when they reached those deeper water areas, hehe.

Sunlight brightens a wide section of the river, just before the corridor makes a sharp turn to a narrower portion.

A closer look at the turn ahead

The Narrows was definitely one of the highlights of our vacation. We were fortunate in the timing of our visit, as the week before our vacation there had been much rain, which makes the Narrows a dangerous place to be due to the potential for flash floods. But during our visit, there was bright sunshine, clear skies, and no rain for miles.

As for the world’s fattest squirrel, here it is:

Aside from all the other reasons not to feed wildlife at a national park, this one should be obvious — nature did not intend for this squirrel to be this fat!

I told you so.

Next time we’re able to visit Zion, we’ll stay longer and see all that we missed, and with any luck get to walk the Narrows once more. But we had to move on, as we had a long drive ahead of us — Wyoming bound!