Zion National Park, Utah

October 5, 2025

We were due to arrive at Watchman Campground within Zion National Park on September 29. We had guests flying in from Atlanta on September 30 to join us. The government was set to shutdown on October 1, possibly resulting in our campground getting shuttered. Our stay was either going to be short-lived--resulting in a really short blog post, or it was going to be epic-- resulting in a long post. To find out which scenario played out, you'll just have to keep reading!

Spoiler alert...this post is quite long.

Julie was getting nervous on the morning of September 29 when the government shutdown was practically a done deal. There was no word from the Zion National Park website as to what the status of Watchman Campground would be. Because the national parks contribute so heavily to the local economies, The Utah legislature had earlier in the year committed to keeping their national parks open with "limited services" in the event of a government shutdown. The problem was that no one could exactly define "limited services". Did that include campgrounds or not? Julie called the campground directly and was told that even employees and camp hosts wouldn't know if the campground was closing or not until 12:01 am on October 1. With Julie's brother-in-law (Eric) and niece (Rebecca) coming to visit, it was time to come up with a contingency plan in the event that we got kicked out of the campground.

During the drive to Zion, Julie scoured the nearby state park campgrounds' reservations websites to see what, if anything, was available last minute. There was one campsite left at Sand Hollow State Park, and she pounced on it. It wouldn't be ideal, but it would be better than driving aimlessly around the Southwest looking for a place--any place--to park a trailer. That really wasn't the kind of adventure that the guests had signed up for.

The drive out of Cathedral Gorge State Park

The scenery soon got more dramatic

Just outside of Zion National Park

The day after getting settled into our campsite and before our guests arrived, we hopped on our bikes to tour the park because we didn't know if that would be our only opportunity. The weather looked a little threatening, but the scenery was amazing. We got sprinkled on a little, but then the clouds passed and all was good.

The dark cloud's bark was far worse than its bite

The rounded peak at center-right has a trail to the top called Angel's Landing

We walked a trail that followed the Virgin River

This is a rare shot with hardly any people in it

This is more representative of the trail

Wading the Virgin River through the canyon is a thing here. Local outfitters will even rent you shoes and a stick.

This squirrel really needs to go on a diet!

A sign in the shuttle bus

Because Julie got kind of a late start in writing this post and she just wants to get it done, and her readers probably don't have the time or patience for a novel (if only it would be that exciting), she is just going to cut to the chase here... The campground didn't close, and the only reductions of services that we noticed were that the museum was locked and nobody was collecting fees to get into the park. Oh, happy day! Sand Hollow State Park got cancelled, and we resumed our regularly scheduled program as if nothing had happened.

Eric and Rebecca arrived on Tuesday evening and stayed with us through Sunday afternoon. The weather was picture perfect, and we soon settled upon a daily routine. We had breakfast, walked about 1/4 mile from our campsite to the free shuttle bus, hiked a scenic trail, took the shuttle back to the campsite, ate lunch, lounged on the rear deck, had sundowners on the deck, ate dinner, lounged around some more, and went to bed. In the morning we got up and did it all over again with a different scenic hiking trail. It was great.

The pictures that follow are from various hikes in the park. Each hike varied in length from under a mile to about 4 miles round trip, with elevation gains up to 1200' or so. Some trails were crowded; some were not. There was a lot of good variety. Long time readers will notice a complete lack of our usual GPS maps. A couple of the first hikes ended with us making a bit of a dash to catch a waiting bus which led to Rick forgetting to stop and save the GPS track (oops). Two other hikes were in canyons where the GPS decided that it would record us flying around the park like a drone (the GPS does not like tight canyons). Other hikes were too short to bother with and by the end we just gave up 😄.

Dinnertime at our campsite

Morning sun lighting up the canyon peaks

The trail to Scout Lookout was probably the most crowded trail in the park

Eric demonstrating that the height of the drop-off didn't bother him at all 😉

This was the drop-off

We kept going higher

The chipmunks were a bit demanding on the popular trails

The path in red is the Angel's Landing portion of the hike that we didn't take. You need a permit, and it is not for those with a fear of heights!

Our daily routine of hanging on the deck

The Sand Bench Trail was...sandy (and not crowded at all)

The peaks are named after the three patriarchs of the Old Testament--Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob

Did we mention that there was a lot of sand on this trail?

After we had already gone up several hundred feet of mostly sand, we were slightly dismayed to see that we still had to go over that ridge

But the views were worth it!

Eric treated us to dinner in Springdale one night. Our campground was conveniently located near town, and we were able to walk to the restaurant.

No picture of the restaurant, unfortunately, but this was our view walking there.

Walking under a "waterfall" of the Emerald Pools network of trails

You can kind of see where the rock is wet from the waterfall and the people below it

The trails were very well maintained

Behind us, you can see a little bit of water on the ground. That is the source of one of the "waterfalls".

One of the Emerald Pools

The Kayenta Trail had great views

We lent Eric and Rebecca our ebikes for an afternoon ride through the canyon

On Saturday, we switched things up a bit and drove to the east side of the park which does not have shuttle service. This is the Canyon Overlook Trail.

It was a long way down!

The overlook at the end of the trail

Some random off-trail exploring

Julie liked the swirls in the rocks

The Watchman Trail was easily accessed from our campsite

This trail had amazing views the entire way

Eric declared Kiitos Ice Malt Liquor to be the "worst he ever had". It was slightly improved with the addition of a little agave syrup. 😉

One last view of the Virgin River before we left

We really enjoyed our time with Eric and Rebecca and are so grateful that the campground stayed open and the weather was near perfect. This trip will definitely be remembered fondly!

Laundromat drama postscript:

It seems that we have a habit of laundromat drama after saying goodbye to camper guests. The afternoon after Eric and Rebecca left, we headed to the nearby Zion Park Laundry. It got good reviews, was close by, had parking, and was open until 10pm.

We parked (for free), and hauled our dirty laundry into the building to find...

...that it was completely gutted. We just stared. Then we walked all the way around the building and down the street a bit to see if we got the wrong place. Nope. It was just gone.

So, we drove another 20 miles to the town of Hurricane where we found a very pleasant laundromat with the added bonus of a grocery store next door. At least this laundromat drama had a happy ending!

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