Zion/Vegas Trip Day 4: chill morning, Argentina + the Narrows!

Monday, June 22, 2026

Our full Sunday yielded way to a slower Monday morning.

Ethan and Ivan were dead set on watching the Argentina game at 11:00, which was fine with me as I really did want to watch it too.

We absolutely “could” have gone out at the crack of dawn and done another hike before the game, but frankly, we didn’t want to. Our family enjoys the outdoors and the hikes but we’re also not like, “must. do. all. the. hikes” people either. (I mean, if I felt like there was another “must do” experience I maybe would have, but I was comfortable with the variety of hikes we already had in our itinerary. Plus the e-bikes really gave us an immersive look at the park, too.)

All that to say, a relaxing morning sounded really nice. I wanted some time to enjoy our hotel, too!

I woke up around ~7 and had some alone time in the hotel lobby area with hot tea.

People trickled down after (except Asher who slept until 9 and Ivan had to wake him up because the hot breakfast ended at 9!).

It was very lovely.

Eventually Ethan and I moved out to the pool/hot tub. I spent from about 9-10:45 with my feet in the hot tub finishing my post on my phone and then a bunch of swimming!

The views from pool area are so gorgeous.

Me and Iván swimming 🙂

Ethan went in early to get ready for the Argentina game! Has his Messi Argentina jersey on:

After quick showers etc most of us reconvened in the lobby area to watch the game at 11!

Our viewing party, Argentina vs Austria:

Very good game with 2 awesome Messi goals!! Lots of fun. 🤩

When the game ended we got ready and headed out! I’ll admit a small part of me felt a teeny bit antsy – did we “waste” the whole morning at Zion sitting around in the hotel?! BUT I reminded myself that this is VACATION and relaxing and enjoying it at the beautiful setting at our hotel with my family was not a waste in any way! I actually liked this morning a lot.

Got ready with our backpack, waterproof shoes, water phone cases and gallon ziplock bags to keep crucial things dry – our afternoon hike would be in a river (the Narrows!).

Headed into town around 1:45- stopped for a yummy Subway lunch.

Then swung by an outdoor outfitter store to rent 4 walking sticks.

From there, we parked at the visitor center and got on the shuttle. (Note- I am SO glad we did the e-bikes on Sunday instead of only using the shuttle. I couldn’t see anything from the shuttle! The views are all up high and were blocked by the bus walls. Also, it was HOT on our shuttle (I think maybe the a/c was just broken on that bus bc the shuttle back was air conditioned.)

But the bikes were like $89/bike to rent so renting for 2 days would have been a lot!

Anyway- took the shuttle to the very last stop for our Narrows hike!

My parents joined for the beginning only- about 1 mile on the mostly flat but still beautiful Riverside Walk. (It was hot- towards the end the mile was feeling long and I was looking forward to getting in the river!!! Haha.)

Getting closer to the river entrance:

The path ends at the river- here we go! This is such a cool, unique hike! The whole thing is hiking up the river in between super tall, beautiful rocks.

My dad snapped a few of these from the shore:

A walking stick is very necessary as the whole river bed is full of rocks/boulders that you have to maneuver around.

We got in the river right at about 3:30 pm. The water felt amazing!!! It can be VERY cold in other seasons (necessitating waterproof waders and neoprene socks) but it felt great yesterday.

Some areas are deep!!

After the initial ~0.5- 1 mile, the crowds cleared out. This is the most popular hike in Zion.

I feel pretty strongly that this was another case of “the late bird gets the worm!” Haha. My favorite travel hack, lol.

“Everyone” says to go early but I knew we’d never be up early enough to actually be “early”, so I opted to try for late afternoon. It was perfection. In much of the hike we had the whole river to ourselves!! And bonus, we weren’t cold at all (mornings are actually quite cool here!).

I once again got sooooo many cool shots.

Ivan and the boys:

Cool one of Asher!

Iván:

Me in the river!

I love this one!!

I mean. How beautiful?!?!

Ethan and Iván:

We snagged a nice lady to take our group photo:

We hiked close to 3 miles through the water trying to find “Wall Street” which is a point at which the rock walls narrow to a very, well, narrow point. Ha. It is super cool!!!

The entire hike is just gorgeous!!! I was swooning over how few people there were at this point. Especially after reading review after review of how packed the Narrows hike is in the summer.

Then we turned around and started hiking back.

A deeper passage:

Beautiful pic!

On the way back we passed a woman laying on a rocky shore area being attended to by a huge crew of “Zion Search and Rescue” people in bright yellow shirts. I gave her a sympathetic look as I hiked past and she smiled and said, “broke my ankle!!” I was like “ohhhh that sucks! Get well soon! 😩”

(Between you and me I have NO IDEA how they were going to get her out. She was… not small. 😬 And she was at least 1.5 miles down the river. Like, how will they carry her out over all the rocks?!? It’s hard enough to even hike alone.)

Finally out of the river! Back on dry land around 6:30, so we spent a good 3 hours in the river. (On the hike out we passed another rescue crew- I asked a guy, are you ALL here for that one lady?? And he said, no, there are 2 accidents….” 😬)

Such a pretty hike out in the evening light. The sun was lighting the rocks up a brilliant red!

Took the shuttle back to the visitor center, got the car, headed back to hotel to meet back up with my parents (who had taken the shuttle out hours earlier and gone to the pub!).

Changed clothes and cleaned up and headed out for dinner.

We ate at Oscar’s which was the #1 Springdale recommendation on TripAdvisor.

It was SO GOOD!! Mostly a lot of TexMex style food but other options too.

Sat outside in a great little patio area. Super cute and the temperature was so nice.

I was ravenous. My appetite has been off the charts! Haha. I guess it’s all the activity and fresh air.

Ivan and I split these amazing nachos (with fresh guac and FRESH jalapeños and blue corn tortilla chips and more) and also shrimp tacos. (I just had one taco.)

I ate an alarming amount of these nachos by myself though. 😳😳

Super cute place! Highly recommend.

Back to the hotel by ~9:30. My parents went upstairs to relax, the boys put a game on and Ivan and I headed out for a long stroll down the main street in Springdale. I felt stuffed and needed to walk off some of those nachos, lol!

Really enjoyed this! We chatted and the warm evening air felt great. I felt better/less stuffed after the walk. Ha.

Then made a cup of nighttime tea, puttered on my phone a bit in bed and then lights out by ~11:00 ish for me! I think the guys were still watching a game for a while.

A fabulous day! 🙂

Really loved the Narrows hike!! So unique. It’s definitely a must do if you have good balance and can handle hiking over all the rocks!

Today we have to say goodbye to Zion, boo. It’s been so great!