Day 26 (11 August 2016) - Horseshoe bend rafting, Slot Canyons and Zion National Park

We woke up early in Page as we had pre-booked a river rafting trip. The idea was to raft the horse shoe bend, its was very calm water so anyone can do the tour and the company that organises these tours was very professional (Colorado River Discovery). White water rafting trips are available further up the river in the Grand Canyon but these trip are inevitable longer. We had taken the half day option.

Colorado River Rafting

Slot Canyon

While rafting we learnt that there was a slot canyon that we could visit without the extortionate charges. This is a worth while thing to as a slot canyon is an amazing visual site. We visited the Water Holes Canyon just outside of Page on highway 89 it was mid day and it was a detour as we had planned to visit Zion National Park. The parking is just off road and you had to follow a trail of stones laid out by someone to help you navigate to a place where you can climb down into the canyon.

The Waterhole Canyon is a cheaper alternative to Antelope Canyon which can only be visited by tours. Antelope Canyon is more scenic and you can get excellent photographs if you go at certain points of the day.

Here are our photographs of Waterhole Canyon

Zion National Park

After the waterhole canyon we continued our journey on to Zion National Park and Cedar City which was going to be our stop for the night before we concluded our trip in Las Vegas. Unfortunately for us Zion National Park was closed as the access road had a rock fall. So we skirted around the edge of Zion, the park seems to have a lot of parallels with Yosemite. So are we skirted around the park we didn't feel we missed much.

Route for the day

We wanted to take Highway 9 through Zion but unfortunately the park gates were closed for the day. So we skirted north around Zion.