My wife and I decided that we needed a little time out; this hanging around home all the time is so exhausting! So we decided to check out the area around St. George, Utah. St. George is slightly under 200 miles away so it's not a tremendous journey. We've driven through St. George many times since it is on the I-15 but we had never stayed there. It is also of interest because it is fairly close to Zion National Park, Bryce Canyon National Park and even the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. So, off we went!
We took the dog mostly because we haven't found a kennel for him yet. He spent some nasty time in the local animal shelter and we don't want to make him think those days are returning. So we had to find a pet friendly motel and, because he is a nitwit and barks when he is left alone, we got to eat more take-out food. Hmmm, sounds a lot like home! Anyway, we drove up on Tuesday being careful to stop in Las Vegas at a restaurant that has some outdoor seating where we could eat with the dog by our side. Driving up through Nevada is a lot like home except that the elevations are higher.
Then I-15 cuts through a corner of Arizona. This is stolen from Google Maps. It gives you a hint of the Virgin River Gorge in Arizona.
It is a short part of the journey but very nice. Unfortunately there are few places to stop along side the road. There is actually a Virgin River that is running next to the highway; down maybe 100 feet but it's there.
So we got to St. George and spent a quiet night having Thai takeout for dinner. Tuesday we wanted to make a loop through Zion and on to Kanab, UT which we were hoping to use sometime in the future as a place to park the trailer while visiting the North Rim. Zion was crowded! I wasn't expecting crowds in the middle of the week; maybe they were Spring Break people but it was busy. The roads were clean but there was snow on the mountain sides.
We just drove through the park. We aren't really back country hikers and the dog certainly isn't! Anyway, we got to see a bit of that beautiful park then went on to Kanab which wasn't quite as wonderful as we'd hoped but it will probably do for a couple nights. We ended up back in St. George in time for some takeout Mexican food from a nearby restaurant.
Thursday we found our way back home; amazingly enough timing it so we got lunch in Las Vegas again. That night I noticed that our heatpump was cycling on and off a lot. So Friday we got to have a visit from a local repair person. He spent a LOT of time checking things then, hoping he found the problem, he recharged the system and we'll just see how that works. So far it is working but if there is a very small leak I'm sure we'll find it given a bit of time!
I can certainly recommend spending some time in Zion even if it is full of people. St. George seemed like a nice little town. So we had fun. I hope you did as well. Take care and keep washing those hands!
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