Zion’s National Park (the fast trip)

What a long adventurous week we just had.  So many places to go, so many things to see.  We started our journey in St. George, Utah and headed up the road through Zion’s National Park.  Why do I call this the fast trip?  Because we actually didn’t go into the canyon because you have to take a tour bus to do that and we were in a hurry to get to our next destination (which was just as fabulous).  Although we didn’t go into the canyon, the scenery was so beautiful and we did get some great pictures. 

The highlight for me was driving through the mile long tunnel.  I thought it would never end.  The Zion-Mt. Carmel Tunnel was opened in 1930 It is 1.1 miles long and took 3 years to build at a cost of $1,896,000.  The tunnel allows motorists to travel through the park and then  on to Bryce Canyon and the Grand Canyon.  There is your history lesson for the day.  There are “little” windows in the tunnel that were built for air and light and also extracting debris during construction.  From the side of the mountain they look small but drivng past them in the tunnel, they appear large enough to drive a car through.  The tunnel is only big enough for one lane of traffic to go through at a time, so there is a wait on each end to go through. 

Next time through Zion’s I am definitely taking the tour bus into the canyon.  Because if what we saw was just a small portion of the beauty, I can only imagine imagine what the rest of the canyon looks like.


Leave a Reply