So I allowed four hours to get back to my hotel in Las Vegas. As it turns out, that’s exactly how much time it took me, from 1 to 5 p.m., to conclude a two-day excursion of a little more than 400 miles.
Rock Shops
My first stop was at a couple of rock shops in Springdale,
the little community just outside the park’s entrance. The first was a little
house on the side of the road called the Zion Prospector. Cute little place,
but for some reason, I was the only one there.
The second place was a lot “shackier” with tables full of
impressively colored rocks outside. Now, that
store (Zion Rocks & Gem) had quite a few people wandering around wearing
heavy gloves and hefting volleyball-sized rocks around the place.
What really caught my eye was that box full of fossil shark
teeth, marked for sale at 50 cents apiece. If I didn’t have a bagful of these
things already, I would have bought a few.
But, as you know, I was on a time schedule (didn’t want to get into
Vegas after the sun had set).
Fort Zion
Then, just down the road in Virgin, I stopped at a place
called the Fort Zion Trading Post. It’s like a cartoon version of an Old West
town in which one could probably spend an hour or two. Unfortunately, it was
closed and the entrance to the parking lot was chained.
So much for that adventure. Still, it was nice to look at and
photograph.
As if to compensate me for my interest, a beautiful
white rooster with a brilliant-red coxcomb and wattles came rushing out to
greet me, running maybe 50 yards from the trading post entrance to peck the
ground around my feet.
“Hey, pretty poor timing,” he seemed to cluck at me. “You
should have been here yesterday when everything was open. You see that door?
Behind that door are Western wonders that will leave you chirping with joy.”
Rotten rooster, rubbing it in.
Heritage Park
My final stop was in the town of Hurricane, at the corner of
State and Main Streets – The Hurricane Valley Heritage Park & Museum, which
honors the pioneers that trekked the desert to establish towns and settlements
in Southern Utah.
The prominent feature of the park is the Pioneer Gratitude
monument sculpted by George O. Cornish, who donated his work that depicted a
pioneer family working hard to make a life for themselves and their community.
Hurricane had its beginning in 1906 with the arrival of 11 Mormon
pioneer families, who faced hatred and religious bigotry.
I didn’t visit the museum as my watch was screaming at me to
get back on the road. So, with radio station KURR (“It’s About Variety!”)
turned up loud on my car radio, I head-rocked and butt-danced to the music of
the Beach Boys (“I sailed on the sloop John B” … “Round, round, get around, I get
around”), the Eagles (“Take it eee-eeasy, take it easy”) and Steppenwolf (“Bo-o-orn
to be wi-i-ild”).
Ya gotta sing on a road trip, right?
Ahhh … at last, I found myself rolling into Las Vegas, with the bright lights of
downtown sparkling before me.
Good trip. Utah rocks!
2 comments:
As much as I enjoyed your commentary, the last part made me start to sing with the radio.
Radios were made for road trips, no?
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