So for a couple of days, we rode out the storm in the bar of the casino and paid for our drinks with winnings from the video poker machines. They even tried to kill me at one point by serving me some raw chicken. These places will try anything to get rid of the winners!
When the storm eventually relented, we started heading east again. We were teased by the bright lights of Vegas but didn't stop. We would eventually double back and spend some time there but for now, we had our sights set on Zion.
Zion is a national park in southern Utah, characterised by a maze of plunging red sandstone canyons surrounded by lofty plateaus and mesas. The east and west sides of the canyon are defined by the Virgin River which etches its way along the canyon floor, culminating in the "Narrows", a tight gorge with 3000ft canyon walls either side.
Zion is a Mecca for hikers and climbers because of its many challenging trails and cliff faces. If you asked what I do for fun, hiking and climbing would probably not be the first two words on the list, but I did have an ulterior motive for our visit to this particular location. I'd decided it was where I was going to propose to Sharon!
It was actually one of a few locations I had in mind to finally pop the question (you don't work in I.T. for nine years without learning the importance of having a backup plan!). My first choice had been Alaska, with the Northern Lights as a backdrop. We did see them briefly when we were there, but it wasn't as spectacular a show as I know they're capable of. Also, at the time I was holding out for the stunning scenery of Denali National Park rather than the city park just outside Fairbanks where we were camping at the time, so I decided to hold off.
Unfortunately, that's when we started having mechanical problems with the RV and ended up spending the next couple of weeks in and out of various garages. By the time we got out of there, the weather had turned and we barely got a glimpse of the Aurora again. I think our clearest skies (and therefore best chance to see the Northern Lights) happened when we were parked up at Walmart in Fairbanks. I'm not the most romantic soul in the world, but even I couldn't bring myself to drop to one knee in a puddle of engine oil under the flickering, fluorescent mood-lighting of a supermarket car park, surrounded by other abandoned RVs, our only witness a local semi-hobo living out of his car with some very suspicious stains on his clothes.
So fast forward a couple of months and my second option, Zion, was looking like the best one. As I said, Zion is full of hiking trails and one of the most well-known is the 2 1/2 mile walk to Angel's Landing, the peak of a 1500ft tall rock formation in the north of the park.
My research told me that it was a strenuous hike but that the summit provides spectacular, humbling views of Zion and if you go early enough, you get to watch the sun rise over the canyon. I figured that moment of exhilaration as we reached the top of the world and saw the sun peek into the canyon and start to bathe it in sunlight would be the perfect time. And fortunately this time, I had the weather on my side when we arrived, with clear skies all around.
By 5:05am on the day of the hike, I'd already completed arguably the most difficult task of the day as I managed to gently stir Sharon from her slumber without incurring her wrath and losing an arm or something. Anticipating the heat that would come when the sun eventually rose, I left the RV wearing shorts and a T shirt and immediately spun on my heels and went back inside to put some jeans on and an extra shirt. I'm the kind of person who only wears a coat for about two weeks of the year back home but even to me, it was bloody freezing!
We jumped on the park shuttle and left it at the "Grotto" drop-off point. The first section of the Angels Landing trail follows the Virgin River, slowly gaining elevation in sandy terrain. We eventually left the river behind and started to tackle a mile-long series of broad switchbacks. Nothing overly challenging at this point, but we were already at a fairly high elevation and the thinning air did take us by surprise a bit. Each stop we made to take photos was a welcome chance to catch our breath!
We seemed to have the whole park to ourselves, apart from one guy who glided effortlessly past us up the ascent sporting nothing but a brown cloth robe and sandals, looking like an extra from "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon".
The next leg of the walk took us through "Refrigerator Canyon", named for its welcome shades and cool breezes. It was heating up a bit now so this stretch was refreshing, plus it was relatively flat so a good chance to regroup and prepare for what was to come next.
A little beyond the two mile mark we came to a set of 21 tighter, steeper switchbacks named "Walter's Wiggles", after Zion's first (and evidently fairly sadistic) superintendent who engineered the trail in 1926.
After Walter's Wiggles we arrived at Scout Lookout, a relatively flat clearing where we could pause to eat some breakfast.
At this point, there's only about half a mile left to the summit, but it's this final half mile that makes the trail so infamous. Essentially you have to haul yourself up a steep, narrow ridge using the chains intermittently anchored along the route. If not for the chains, you'd have no clue which way to go as there are no discernible paths and very few footholds in the rock itself. Several people have fallen to their deaths in recent years trying to traverse this last section.
We went as far as we could up this portion of the trail, reaching a small peak a few hundred yards from the true summit. Our footwear was struggling to keep its grip on the rocks by this point and I think if we went any further, we might have made it up OK but would probably have struggled to get back down again, so we agreed that we would stop there.
Fortunately we'd made it far enough to enjoy an amazing view of the canyon below. We sat for a while looking out over the park and felt justified in our decision not to go any further when we looked down and saw a few other people reach the start of the section we'd just climbed and turn back, thinking better of it. Our Shaolin Monk friend from earlier soon put us back in our place though as he passed us again in the opposite direction, coming down from the summit - in bare feet!
We stayed put and I waited for the sun to start rising and then presented the ring, getting down on one knee as carefully as I could to avoid pulling us both over the cliff edge to fall to some kind of ironic Shakespearean doom.
Her response to the big question? Well technically her first words were "Don't drop the ring!!" but fortunately, this was followed swiftly by "Yes"!
We sat and watched the view a while longer before heading back the way we came to our campsite. Predictably, as soon as we got to the bottom, we instantly regretted not making it all the way to the top, but I guess this way we can go back one day, reminisce and maybe finally conquer it.
We spent about another day in Zion, much of which was taken up with spreading the news via Skype, Facebook, etc. We did do another short walk the following day but by that point, Sharon had slipped into some kind of diamond-induced trance gazing into the ring, so in the interest of public safety on the trails we made it a short one and just chilled out for a while before moving on!
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