The plan is Trans Zion. Lucky for me my partner volunteered to set the entire thing up. Shuttles, timeline, camping spots, permits, and the like. But I am not lucky because all this brutal footwork, instead extremely thankful. Lucky because she planned a “down day” between my 24 hour race and the Trans Zion.
After a morning of double checking our plans and putting everything in order we decided to ride our bikes up the park’s main valley. We left the campground and rode for a little while up the Parus Trail, a paved bike trail.
The cool feature of the Parus Trail is that it snakes and crosses the Virgin River many times affording us many photo ops of the fall scenery. We pretty much had this trail to ourselves since it was off-season and the roads were open for cars. I mean if you can drive why walk? Right?
The ride up the paved road named Zion Canyon Scenic Drive was pretty sketch. Not because of severe neck strain to see all the sights. No, it was the motorists. Normally it is park buses only allowed on the scenic drive. But in the winter they rule and just assume they own the road. Lots of frustrated motorists honked and whizzed by angry at us for having the gull to ride our bikes. But soon we were at the end and locked our bikes at the Riverside Walk trail.
The riverside walk trail just extends the trip up the valley floor by a mile or two. Along the way there are many people feeding squirrels, even with the no squirrel feeding signs, and others looking like professional photographers. How could there be this many photographers in the world? I kept my camera in my pocket for the most part.
Occasionally I spotted a scene so delicious I had to pull my camera out and expose my “touristy” nature. And there was no way I would be mistaken for a professional photographer because my camera came out of my pocket. I stood there for 20 minutes to wait for a moment when no people were in the scene. Snap!
We even did a “couples” photo in which it looks like I have taken my partner hostage. Maybe I did. It was the end of our hike and I felt disappointed. I thought the trail would have gone deeper into the canyon. I mean it was just getting good. Darn.
I mean it just ends … just like that. We watched cold people in wetsuits come shivering out of the canyon. I looked around the corner. It called my name. I sure which I could have kept going. It was time to get back and pack for Trans Zion. I just ignored the urge and went back from where I came. The land of the paved.
Boneshakerbike 
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