Boy has it been a mixture of weather and landscape today.I woke up in Mt. Carmel Utah and found that it had been showering all night long. I had my breakfast and checked out of the motel because I found that I did not need another day in the area. I headed for the Zion National Park which was 30 or so miles away. It started raining again as I was driving and proceeded to get heavier as I approached the park. The drive into the park is beautiful great tall cliff all around and a road that is as crooked as any I have seen and most of the road was down hill. At one point the road goes through a tunnel that at the time it was dug was considered the longest. Interesting this tunnel has several fairly sharp turns in it and is down hill. Some are right turns others are left turns. I have never seen turns in a tunnel. I am not sure but I think the tunnel was close to a half mile long. Along the way there were areas where you could see out of the tunnel wall on the right side. At these points the wall was literally the edge of the mountain and these openings were for fresh air. The drive into the park as I said was breath taking. I have been looking on this whole trip to see some big horn sheep. Today I finally saw some. In fact I had to stop the car and follow a couple of them down the road. I saw 5 in total. Four in one group and a single one standing on a rock ledge near the road watching the cars go by. He was not the least bit afraid. One guy walked across the road taking pictures from different angles and the old boy just turned his head so he keep an eye on the guy. In spite of the rain this made my day.
Zion National Park
Strolling Down The Road
At the Visitor Center it was now raining very hard. I checked with a ranger who was monitoring the weather radar on his computer and telling people who asked that the rain was expected to continue for next 3 hours. That settled it for me. I did some shopping in the book store and headed out of the park. This morning it was a cool 52 degrees. About noon when I got to Las Vegas it was 101 and it stayed in the 101 to 104 range until I got here at Bakersfield, California where I am spending the night. Also the terrain changed from lush green to dried and parched grass. The traffic in both directions from Las Vegas to Barstow, California was literally bumper to bumper and moving at the speed limit which in most places is 75 MPH. At Barstow it thinned out.
I guess I am a day ahead of schedule and will arrive at daughter Janice's house tomorrow. As you can tell I have only posted two photograph and that is all I can do.
I want to continue to remind you that God loves you and so do I.
Grandpa Bill
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