Journey to Zion: A Runner's Account

"A man can worship God among these great cathedrals as well as in any man-made church"

- Isaac Behunin, Mormon pioneer

At the edge of the town of Springdale, UT, just before the entrance gate into Zion National Park, there is a little coffee shop where sunlight streams in the windows and people sit at the handful of tables, clutching steaming mugs while they plan the day's adventures. That morning, Jamie and I were among them, and we lazily devoured breakfast burritos and sipped coffee while reading through the information on our planned hike for the day: The Narrows.

"Do you really think we need all this gear?" I asked skeptically, looking up from the brochure. "Waterproof pants? And special boots?"

Jamie shrugged and took another sip of coffee.

We'd come to Utah to run through Zion Canyon after last year's trip left us both touting its wonders to anyone who would listen. If you're going to name a place Zion, it had better have some spectacular offerings, and I have to hand it to the early settlers of Utah: They got this one 100% right. There are few places on earth as captivating as the red walls of Zion National Park.

We had one more day before our planned group run, and I wanted to see a part of the park we wouldn't get to see on our run.

We discussed other options for our hike. Maybe a hike that would be less complicated than walking up a river through a narrow canyon?

"Let's just do it," I finally declared.

"I mean, we're here, right?" Jamie agreed.

It was absolutely the right call.

The Virgin River flows down from the high country, slicing through the earth and winding its way out the mouth of Zion Canyon. Our path would take us upstream from where the trail ends, through the walls of an ever-narrowing canyon. There's a reason this is one of the more popular and well-known hikes in the park, but since it was a Friday and not peak-season, the crowds turned out to be minimal.

Once in the park, we walked down the easy trail in our too-big dry-pants, clutching walking sticks and full of bright anticipation. After a mile or so, our trail came to an end, and other hikers found themselves forced to turn around. We felt like grand adventurers as we left the trail and stepped boldly into the icy waters of the Virgin River.

Unlike moving on a trail, walking through the Narrows is slow and requires thoughtful choices about each footfall. As we picked our way upstream, we constantly crossed back and forth from one side of the river to the other, using our sticks for balance. At times, the water was thigh-deep, and other times, we could hit a dry bank on one side and scramble over the rocks.

All the while, the red walls closed in, giving us the feeling that we were headed deep into the Earth itself.

To say we were enjoying ourselves would be a vast understatement.

After the magic of last year's Zion trip, I knew it would be difficult for this sequel to live up to my expectations. Attempts to recreate a perfect experience can so often end in disappointment. It was already apparent though, that no such fate would befall this weekend.

The canyon became colder and darker as we continued our casual pace upstream. The walls grew so close together that the November sun could not penetrate. Soft sounds of water lightly rushing over stone were amplified by the imposing stone walls, and conversation became minimal as we immersed ourselves in our own thoughts and the majestic beauty around us. I had never been anyplace like the depths of that red canyon.

We spent about five hours exploring the Narrows, and while it is difficult to pick out one highlight from this weekend trip, I do think choosing that hike was the best decision we made.

That evening we caught up with Stacy and Donald in Springdale for dinner and went over plans for the following day's run. Stacy, of Wilderness Running Company, was our logistics coordinator, and the mastermind behind both this, and last year's Zion trips. If it wasn't for him, none of us would be there. Donald - bad-ass runner, fellow blogger, friend and pacing buddy - also made the trip out from California to join the group for a day on Utah trails. After Jamie and I finished gushing about our day in the Narrows, we solidified plans to run about 30 miles the following day. Bellies full of calzones, she and I headed back to our hotel in a state of satisfied bliss, looking forward to another day of adventure in the park.

Saturday morning started early, with the four of us heading from the Zion high country down the Wildcat Trail. After about six miles or so, we would hook-up with the West Rim Trail and run the same route that we'd run on the first day of last year's trip, down into the canyon and up to the East Rim. A glowing sunrise held all the promise of a perfect day.

There is little better than sharing a new and glorious trail with good friends who also happen to be excellent running partners. Add to that the mild fall weather and breathtaking scenery, and it would be difficult to conceive of a better day. Once again, Zion delivered beautifully.

After a few miles on the West Rim Trail, the photo stops began in earnest. I figured we may as well take the whole day to run our 30 miles, right?

The fall leaves were in fierce competition with the canyon walls for brilliant displays of color, and I spent most of the day smiling, gawking, and making intelligent exclamations like, "Wow!" and "Oh!" and "Beautiful!"

Fortunately, I wasn't the only one engaged in such tourist-like awe.

I made a brief detour with Donald out to Angel's Landing, and I'm fairly certain he set the fastest-known-time-while-impeded-by-tourist-traffic for the trip. Luckily, neither one of us fell off, and I'm pretty sure we didn't knock any tourists off either.

Just past the turn-off from Angel's Landing, the trail descends sharply toward the canyon floor. I chased Donald down a long series of switchbacks while I grilled him about why he never became a rock climber. If his antics across Angel's Landing were any indication, he was sitting on some un-tapped talent. I kept up my insistent pestering all the way to the river, where, just like last year, Lisa had set up a fabulous picnic for us.

We regrouped with Stacy and Jamie while I happily stuffed food in my face. My recent training mileage had amounted to approximately zero, so my legs were already feeling the 20+ miles for the day. I knew they had another eleven in them though, and I kicked back on the picnic bench, downed a second can of Coke, and gazed up at the golden cottonwood trees, feeling both physically and spiritually sated.

As difficult as it was for me to tear myself away from that peaceful scene, I also knew the beauty of the trail that lay ahead. With both my stomach and my hydration pack re-filled to capacity, I trotted down the road a few pounds heavier, in pursuit of my three companions.

The East Rim Trail climbs quickly from the canyon floor, and I was happy enough to ascend because it meant I could walk instead of run. I still needed time to digest, and of course, take more photos.

The trail headed into the very wall of the canyon, and colors changed from red to white, and sometimes back to red again. We ran along rock walls, leapt small drainages, and skirted deep gorges. The day continued its easy rhythm, each person taking the lead on occasions which felt right.

As is my way on these kinds of days, I gradually fell toward the back of our little group. I was tired, and felt no need to push myself. The need that I felt in fact, was the emotional dragging-of-feet that seizes me at the end of a day like this - a day that has been anticipated for so long. I ached to stretch it all out just a few more minutes, to soak it all in.

Donald kindly waited for me to run in the last couple miles, and we shared the trail in companionable peace. I had already begun my off-season hiatus from running, and this day was a brilliant reminder of why I would be excited to return to training in a few weeks time.

Explorations of beauty like this, when you're with friends, but yet still feel the solitude of the wilderness and a connection with the Earth that brings a sense of inner tranquility - well, these are the best days on trail, the best days to be an ultra runner. And it was these thoughts that were drifting through my mind, when, without warning, we found ourselves at the end of our beautiful run.

I know there will be more days on stunning trails with good friends, but days like this one are special. My trips to Zion have taught me that sometimes it's worth it to make the extra effort to go somewhere new, somewhere a little far away and a little hard to get to. Sometimes it's a great idea to travel with new people, whom I don't know that well, who then become excellent training partners, and even better friends.

Sometimes running through nature's cathedrals is the perfect tonic for soothing a tired spirit and reminding a person why she loves this passion called running.

Where I've Been

Autumn has proven to be a busy time of year this go-around. I do think however, that when one is too busy adventuring to find time for blogging, it can only be considered a good thing. And that, my friends, is essentially the state of things.


Following is a list of what has been keeping me busy in the past several weeks. They all really deserve blog reports of their own, but said reports may or may not materialize. Depends how much adventuring is in the near future, I suppose.



1. Long trail runs through Desolation Wilderness with Jamie


2. The Long Beach Marathon


3. The Girls on the Run 5K, Halloween edition


4. A long weekend of outdoor bliss in Zion National Park


5. A 5-day school field trip to the Marin Headlands Institute

Ginny Weasley graces the GotR 5k. My friends thought I was a total nerd, but I got tons of recognition and compliments on the costume from all the kids in the race. Learned this day: Running fast in a pencil skirt is not easy.

The beginning of The Narrows, ZNP. This weekend included a day spent exploring a magnificent slot canyon, and a day running through paradise with good friends. Life doesn't get much better.

As a teacher, you know that when your classroom looks like this, you're doing something right.

Pure Bliss in Zion National Park

There are rare occasions in life where the right people come together in the right place for an adventure that turns out to be more than just the sum of its parts. When the parts themselves are amazing—consider the stunning Zion National Park, a small group of talented and intrepid ultra-runners, and an unmatchable host—you’re destined for the kind of magic that makes for a truly unforgettable weekend.

When the Wilderness Running Company announced its intention to host “Pure Zion”—a weekend of trail running in Zion National Park—there were a million reasons why it made no sense for me to go: I was just starting a new job and couldn’t imagine requesting time off; With my husband in school and the two of us surviving on just my salary, I certainly couldn’t justify the expense; It fell just a week after a hard 50 mile road race, and my legs surely would not be ready for another weekend of 40+ miles; And, as it turns out, Zion is a somewhat tricky place to get to, making a weekend visit feel rather impractical. Nevertheless, I blew off all the voices of reason in my head, and went with the little devil on my shoulder that told me to go for it. Turns out, that devil must have been an angel.

I first began working with the Wilderness Running Company last spring, writing a few gear reviews and a trail report for them. I’ve already explained how it was clear to me just from their website that I was very much in line with the mindset and philosophy of these folks. So, needless to say, I was pretty excited to finally meet Stacy and Lisa Young, the dauntless husband and wife duo behind WRC, in person.

I invited all the cool runner chicks I could think of that lived nearby, and luckily two of them enthusiastically jumped on-board with the plan. I only knew both Jamie and Jenny from having run several of the same races in the past several years. They are both talented runners, and as it turns out, fun and easy-going women, making them the perfect adventuring partners for the weekend. All of the airport and car-rental headaches were eased as we spent time swapping stories and getting to know each other, while Jenny initiated the ongoing joke of the weekend by teasing Jamie about passing her with three miles to go at Western States this year. We hadn’t even left Reno yet when I already found myself reveling in the pleasures of just being around other ultra-runners.

Bryon and Meghan made the trek out from Yosemite to round out what felt like the perfect running group for the weekend. I first encountered Meghan when reading her race report from Marathon de Sables last spring. If you want a little insight into her utter coolness, check out this post (among others) on her blog. I met and spent a little time hanging with both Meghan and Bryon at Michigan Bluff during Western States this year, and was stoked that they were with us for the Zion experience.

Jamie and Jenny and I arrived in Springdale Friday afternoon after the flight from Reno to Las Vegas, followed by a three-hour drive. Springdale is situated on the Virgin River, right at the mouth of Zion Canyon. It’s a somewhat eclectic collection of tourist shops, art galleries, and quaint, older houses where fence-posts of gnarled cottonwood branches brace lengths of wire, enclosing a handful of cows or horses in each miniature pasture. Mature trees, alive with the colors of autumn, shade the sidewalks, while hand-painted signs advertise local wares like cactus jelly and bumbleberry jam. After checking into our hotel, we browsed the stunning photos at several of the local galleries, getting excited for the adventure ahead. We joined Stacy, Lisa, Bryon and Meghan for dinner that night.

All weekend we were treated like rock stars, and it began at dinner on Friday with sweet gear packages from the WRC warehouse. After meeting Stacy and Lisa in person, I was not at all surprised to discover that they were kind, fun and easy people to be with. Stacy laid us out on our route options for the following day’s run, which included potential distances from 7 to 30+ miles. In the end, we all decided to run the same rim-to-rim route of about 26 miles.

The following morning, with Stacy piloting the 15-passenger van, we fueled-up on caffeine at the local coffee house, picked up two local runners, Bob and Mary Jo, and headed to the West Rim trailhead. There was a slight chill in the early-morning air, but it looked to be a perfect day weather-wise, and we set off in shorts and t-shirts, hydration packs full to the hilt, for what would be 15 miles of mostly easy downhill to the canyon floor.

The trail starts out up near the west rim with several miles of fairly flat running, and a few views into the nearby canyons. We kept a pretty mellow pace and spent plenty of time stopping for pictures. This was all perfect in my mind, since my legs were still in complaint-mode after the previous weekend’s effort at Helen Klien.

I really wanted a tour-guide to point out the names of the surrounding peaks, cliffs, mesas and canyons, so I was disappointed, although not surprised, to learn that Stacy wouldn’t be running with us on this day. As it turned out, Bob and Mary Jo filled in nicely in this regard. Although I’m not sure they were initially planning on staying with our group through the run (I think they got the idea that we were fast or something. Ha!), we all ended up touring along together. We didn’t see another soul on this trail all morning. We looked out upon the vast landscape and felt that it was ours alone.

We ran, surrounded with views like this...

...through beautiful landscapes like this...

finding plenty of time for photos and goofing around...

Jamie, Bryon, Mary Jo and Bob enjoy beautiful and easy terrain.

Bryon and the ladies. From L to R: Me, Jamie, Bryon, Meghan, Jenny

Much of the trail was cut directly into the cliff face...

Eventually we came to the turn-off for Angel’s Landing, a half-mile journey that entails scrambling along a steep ridge-line trail, with abrupt drop-offs and unbelievable views. We’d been debating the pluses and minuses of making this short side-trip all morning, and in the end, a few waited at the trail junction, while the rest of us headed off toward the cliff. There were definitely some people on the trail now, but since this wasn’t exactly a runnable section anyway, the added traffic didn’t matter so much.

Meghan negotiates the trail to Angel's Landing

The view from the cliff edge was more than worth the journey, and we even witnessed a California Condor circling just below us.

After we rejoined the rest of the group, we headed down the section of trail known as Walter's Wiggles...

...21 short, but immensely fun switchbacks.

By this time, we had nearly completed the 15 miles to the canyon floor, where Stacy and Lisa awaited us with an incredible spread of picnic goodies. Craving anything in particular? They likely had it!

The dynamic duo behind WRC: Lisa and Stacy Young

We left the safety of fresh sandwiches and popsicles, along with Lisa, Stacy, Bob and Mary Jo, to reverse what we had just done by climbing up the opposite side of the canyon on the East Rim Trail.

Even on the short road section, running through the canyon was pure joy. The cottonwoods shaded us with gold, and steep orange walls parted, allowing us in to secret cracks in their expanse. We climbed upward, knowing we were fighting daylight, but still somehow supremely confident in the perfection of the day. We wouldn’t get caught out in the dark, not with the magic that was clearly present here.

Bryon's view for the day. (This, and all remaining photos courtesy of the awesome Bryon Powell.)

We continued climbing through narrow canyons...

still finding time for goofing and pictures...

and finally found our way to the east rim, and back into the junipers and pines...

By the last few miles we had spread out a bit, and I found myself bringing up the rear of our little group. We’d seen no one else for the last 5 or 6 miles, and it was surprisingly peaceful to find myself alone, on a sandy trail, somewhere in Utah. The sun sank low, casting long shadows and bathing the landscape in a burnished gold. My ears were alive with silence, and the soft shush-shush of my feet hitting the sand. My legs had been slowly tightening as I ran up the East Rim trail, and now they were crying out in protest, finally feeling every one of the post-race miles. But it didn’t matter; it just didn’t. I ran along, smiling stupidly to myself at the sheer beauty of being here and being alive.

I arrived at the trailhead to find Stacy waiting for us (with treats, of course). How could I possibly explain to him what an amazing day this had been? In the zeal of post-run ecstasy, we stuffed our faces and tried to tell each other about our favorite part of the day, and there were just too many. There was no favorite part for me because it seemed that each new section of trail brought something newly spectacular, yet uniquely different, than the previous. It was such a fantastic blur of awesome that my brain couldn’t sort through it. I was giddy. Totally giddy.

That night, Meghan, Bryon, Jamie, Jenny and I hit up a restaurant in Springdale for some fish tacos and a few pints of Polygamy Porter. I realized once again, how rarely in my life I spend time hanging out with other ultra-runners. It is such a wonderful thing, a soul-affirming thing, if that makes any sense. When you are with people in whom you see a bit of yourself reflected, you start to feel like you, yourself, might actually make some sense. Like maybe you’re not crazy, and maybe it’s everyone else. Like you kind of fit in.

Sunday morning we got a slightly earlier start so Jamie and Jenny and I would have time to shower after the run before checking out of our hotel. I walked stiffly out to the sidewalk to meet Stacy, with my legs in that post-ultra-race-tightness state. I knew they would hurt on the day’s 15-mile run, but I also knew it didn’t matter. They were strong enough to get me through the day, and the day was destined for more trail running greatness. I was all smiles as I climbed into the van and took what had become my standard shotgun seat next to Stacy.

After picking up Bryon and Meghan (and of course, coffee) we headed off to Kolob Canyon for an out and back down into the canyon and along La Verkin Creek. Even during the drive to the trailhead we kept letting out audible gasps, oohs and aahs at the scenery. It was such the pleasure of the entire weekend that we could declare beauty at every turn.

Stacy joined us for the day’s route, which began by heading down into the canyon for several miles along the spine of a small ridge. The surrounding walls of color provided constant distraction, but the precipitous drop-off on both sides of the trail meant I also had to keep an eye on my feet.

Soon we were at the bottom of the canyon, and picking our way alongside the river. The trail was as red as the canyon walls, and buttery leaves rained down gently from above, adding to the warm fall palette. Conversation seemed lighter than the previous day. I know I, for one, was simply trying to soak up every moment of my weekend, knowing that it was to be over soon. I kept craning my neck up at the scenery, and finally realized I needed to take off my visor because it was impeding my view.

We paused for a brief photo-op at our turn-around point, Kolob Arch, before heading back up the trail.

With Stacy, at Kolob Arch

Jamie, Jenny and I parted ways with the rest of the group back at our hotel. As we all exchanged hugs, I was less sad than I would have expected. I still felt imbued with appreciation for every minute of the weekend, and I was pretty confident that there would be future adventures with all of these friends.

I have to confess that this year, more than ever, I have learned the simple joys of being out for long days on trails with friends. While we were standing at the base of Kolob Arch, still chattering away about all things running, Meghan asked me what I think it was that made for such a successful season for me. How was I able to run so many races, so many personal bests, and continue racing for such a long season without burning out? At the time, I didn’t really have an answer. True, I trained harder that in previous ultra-running years, but it’s not that I didn’t already know how to do that. I just lacked the motivation for it. Now, I think I have the answer to Meghan’s question. As much as I love racing, and training hard, I think it was the adventures shared with other runners that sustained my enthusiasm throughout the season. And Zion turned out to be the absolute pinnacle in the range of this summer’s incredible runs.

I can't express enough gratitude to the Wilderness Running Company for dreaming up, and presenting, this event. What an opportunity! You can rest assured, when they disclose whatever their next adventure is, I'll be there.