Erik had to get all the ice and snow off the car, before we could leave our hotel in Bryce Canyon. It was snowing pretty hard again.
Today we had an easy day because we only had to drive 125 miles to St. George. We were planning to visit Zion National Park on the way.
When we got closer to Zion the weather improved a little. The snow was gone, but now we had some showers.

Zion National Park is not as interesting as Bryce or the Grand Canyon, but it is greener, with trees, grass and waterfalls.
When driving to Zion from Bryce Canyon you have to take the East Entrance, which takes you on a road between high mountains, which are about 1.5 miles high.
After a few miles there was quite a long tunnel (1.1 miles) that we had to drive through. On exiting the tunnel we were greeted with a brilliant view of the valley of Zion.
In about 15 minutes we drove from the tunnel high in the mountains, to the visitor center in the valley.
Only a small part of Zion is accessible by car, so first we drove to the end of the road and parked the car at Temple of Sinawava, to take some pictures of the waterfalls there.

After that we decided to walk the Emerald Pools trail. We parked the car at Zion Lodge and crossed the footbridge over the river to the Emerald trail. The first part of the trail is quite easily accessible and after a while we even spotted a deer.
When we had walked about 1 mile we arrived at the lower Emerald Pool and 3 waterfalls. The trail even continues under the waterfalls.

Then the trail became more strenuous as we headed for the top of the waterfalls we had just passed. When we arrived at the top the trail appeared to be gone and we had to jump from stone to stone to get to the other side of the stream.

We had a great view over the Zion Valley and after a while we continued our trip. The trail was not paved anymore and was descending, back to where we had parked our car.

Although the weather wasn't really co-operating, we really enjoyed the day and after having lunch in Zion Lodge we headed for the south exit of the park.
As we drove to St. George the landscape changed into desert, and for the first time in a week, we passed some larger villages.

St. George appeared to be a large village in the desert. It was a lot warmer here and when we arrived at the hotel we changed our winter clothes into summer clothes.
We checked out the city and we really liked it. There were a lot of shops and restaurants.
We stopped at a mall and did some shopping.

Our hotel was located at a main road with lots of other hotels and restaurants. We also spotted our first Sizzler restaurant. In Florida we used to eat there almost every day and we decided to eat there today.
Dinner was quite good and I ate too much. The waitress was very friendly. She asked us where we lived and when we told her we were from Holland she asked us if we wear wooden shoes there. She had to laugh at herself, for asking such a stupid question ,and we laughed with her.

After dinner we drove back to the hotel, which was located in the same street. The hotel room was big, but looked a bit old. The hotel had a pool and a hot tub and Linda and I decided to go swimming for a while. Corine and Erik stayed in the room, because Corine hurt her leg when she had a fight with her suitcase.

We were glad to be back in a city again. More than one week in nature was enough, if you ask me. In Holland we're not used to such isolation, as it is so small and people all live so close together.

Tomorrow we will drive to Las Vegas for a few days of shopping, gambling and eating.

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