Day 4 – Zion National Park, UT to Hoover Dam, NV to Seligman, AZ

Miles driven today: 359 Cumulative miles: 1517 I woke up numerous times last night to the sound of rain on our tent. It wasn’t hard rain, so I figured it would let up eventually. By the time we got up (around 7:30am), it was just a light rain that practically evaporated the instant it hit the ground or tent because it was so warm. So, we got up and made the 5-minute trip to the bathroom before starting to break down camp. By the time we got back, the light rain had once again turned into a downpour. We kicked ourselves for not taking the tent down first thing and sat in the car for 5 minutes trying to devise a plan to make this quick and easy. We spread our dry tarp across all our gear in the back of the car, ran out in the rain, removed the tent stakes, collapsed the tent with the rain fly still on, semi-folded it, semi-folded the ground cloth and tossed it all on the tarp in the back of the car. I was impressed as the whole thing only took about 2 minutes. Seeing as the rain was putting our hiking plans for today on the back burner (we planned to hike to Lower, Middle and Upper Emerald Pools today – the Narrows was a first thought, but we opted to skip that with the threats of flash floods.), we parked the car at the visitor center once again and took the shuttle to the Zion Lodge up-canyon. We browsed the gift shop for a bit and the rain still hadn’t let up. We debated what to do for a few minutes and finally decided to sit down for a good breakfast, headed upstairs to the restaurant at the lodge and ate there. We finished up around 9:45am and it was still pouring (and quite foggy too). So, we got back on the shuttle and went down-canyon to the Zion Human History Museum. We spent about an hour there and the sun finally decided to make an appearance. By this time, it was 11:00am and too late for us to do the hike we wanted (and still get to our next stop at a decent time). We figured the next best thing would be to drive back towards the East entrance (through the tunnel again) and take some pictures of stuff we didn’t on the way in yesterday. Back on the shuttle, back to our car at the Visitor Center, and on the road again. The drive (and photo stops) there and back took us just over two hours and the sun even stayed out the whole time. Got back on the road about 1:30pm and headed west towards Las Vegas, NV. When making our trip itinerary, I didn’t consider the fact that an afternoon departure from Zion would put us driving through Vegas during rush hour. We hit Vegas at about 4:30pm and, surprisingly, never drove any slower than 45mph. Either rush hour comes at a different time in Vegas, or they have something figured out a hell of a lot better than Portland does. We made it through Vegas in no time at all and hit Hoover Dam about 5:30pm. We only stopped long enough to take a few pictures and ooh and ah at the grandiose structure. We also got a glimpse of the bridge that is under construction that will eventually re-route all the traffic that currently goes over the dam. We crossed the dam into Arizona (and into the ‘Arizona’ time zone as they do not observe daylight savings time) and continued through some of the most boring scenery for a few hundred miles (really, this rivals Wyoming – only straighter roads). Two and a half hours after crossing the Hoover Dam, we reached our campground in Seligman, AZ on historic Route 66. By campground I mean a KOA Kampground. Anyone who has been camping at a KOA before knows (or should know – I hope) that KOAs are typically RV parks with luxuries and are only a stop of convenience for tent-camping folk. And that’s exactly what this one was. The Seligman KOA is conveniently situated between Route 66 and I-40. Actually, it’s between somewhat noisy Route 66 and the even noisier train tracks that run alongside I-40. Regardless, it was a place to pitch our tent in the general vicinity we wanted to be in for tomorrow. And – equally as important – it is a place with showers. We checked in and picked a campsite at the far corner (away from other people and RV generators), set up camp, and went straight to the showers. One thing I really like about camping is how much it makes you appreciate simple things – like showers, running water, microwaves, etc. (you get the point). A good half hour later, I emerged a new person. Daniel cooked dinner (okay, boiled water and dumped it into a bag of freeze-dried food – but it was really good!) and pulled out the laptop to download our photos thus far to the computer. I took advantage of the free wi-fi (a perk of many KOAs) and posted my journal to my blog. Bedtime came sometime around 11:30 or midnight – maybe not the smartest thing since we are hiking 10 miles tomorrow… Wildlife seen: mule deer, wild turkeys