Day: October 10, 2012

Day Trip to Zion Part 3 (Virgin, Utah)

Published on by Sandie D1 Comment

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It has been a very long time since driving through Virgin, Utah… Some of the towns have the oddest names… Not sure what they were thinking, but a town named Virgin, I would think they are advertising that there are virgins in the town… And since this area has many volcano’s… I guess some would say they were going to sacrifice a virgin in Virgin, lol… The volcano gods would approve I guess…

This is a very small spot in the road on the way to Zion… Even though we stopped there on the way back home… They tried to make it a little tourist area… So we played tourist for about 30 minutes… They have a small petting zoo and these little buildings that they made into looking like an old western town… The town has less than 400 people… We were just on the road that we take to get to Zion… We didn’t get into the actual town… I guess there is alot of trails and places to do biking and such… You can also go tubing and swimming in the Virgin River…

In order to pet the animals you have to pay 1.00… Not too bad because they are cute and it goes towards feeding them… I’m all for that… They have a cute little donkey, Shetland ponies, deers, and alpacas… There are some chickens and roosters hanging around too… Chuck also got to go to jail at the Virgin Jail… Not sure he was too smart… Because if he paid attention, there were no doors, lol…

They have some off the wall novelty things in the little trading post there… We bought a sucker for my grandson… It is one of those with a bug in it… I didn’t think he would eat it, but I was shocked and a bit sickened over the site of him biting into it… So far he hasn’t gotten to the cricket, but he is curious over it… JJ is 4 and I don’t think he has an inkling of what is what… He is a real boy… He has asked me if it is real, I told him “yes”… Then he asked me if it would bleed if he ate it… I told him “no”…. He is thinking this over pretty heavily… I guess I was thinking he would think it was gross and he didn’t…

One thing that we didn’t get a chance to stop for and we wanted to is the Shoe Tree… We drove past it on the way to Zion and was thinking of stopping to see it on the way back, but it was too late… So here is a little FYI on the Shoe Tree…

Shoe Tree For HikersThis shoe tree has the distinction of being just outside the entrance of one of the most beautiful national parks anywhere in America. The tree is on State Road 9 between mile markers 20 and 21 and is on the south side of the road with several convenient places to pull out and park. In the background you will also see some of the towering red sandstone cliffs of Zion. On the tree you will note that most of the shoes are hiking boots. Legend has it that they are hung here in tribute to the Angels Landing hike in Zion National Park – because once you have completed this hair-raising hike you may as well hang up your boots as nothing else exists to compare with it. Over the years several hikers have lost their lives on that trail and there is truly a spectacular view from the top!I have included pictures of Angels Landing and the Shoe Tree… But they aren’t mine… I found them searching Google…