Spring Break!!... I mean Passover.

If any of you don't know, Touro is a Jewish school and therefore we celebrate Jewish holidays. Fortunately for us, Passover fell at a time so that we got 10 days off from school!! It was a much needed break right after a block week in order to gear up for the final block of school.

Right when I came home from my last exam, Chad surprised me with..... KEENS! I know what you are thinking.. sickness. Because I thought the same thing. I think Keens could possibly be the ugliest shoe known to man. Chad got them specifically so we could go to Zion's and hike the narrows. I sucked up my pride and put on the shoes. I must admit, I am glad that I had them while I was hiking. They are very practical hiking shoes. (ugly but practical)


We set out on our journey to Zion's at 5 am so that we could meet our friend, John, and be able to still hike the narrows that day. So we get our camp site all picked out and we jump on the bus to take us to the beginning of the narrows. On our way up there, we noticed a few things that were a little weird.
Clue 1: There was no one else on the bus that was geared up to hike the narrows (one of the more popular hikes).
Clue 2: When we got off the bus and started up the paved trail before getting in the water, we noticed a few people putting on dry suits. We seriously made fun of them because they were too sissy to get wet.

Then came the water...
We were told by friends and read online that all they up the narrows, you just "waded" from one land piece to the next. Waded meaning ankle deep most of the time and SOME knee deep. Well, it was definitely not like that. Immediately the water was knee deep and it quickly became almost waist deep with hardly any land in site. This wouldn't have been so bad if the water wasn't 40 degrees, and we were in the shade the entire time. It was a little on the chilly side. We hiked up about 15 minutes and I seriously started getting hypothermia. Oh, and the people with dry suits that we were making fun of.... ya, they passed us with little smirks on their faces. We found out the hard way that apparently April is way too early in the season to be hiking the narrows. We turned around and found some sun to bring our body temperatures back up to normal.

This is me before entering the water.










John and I are trying not to get wet. This is the most shallow part. We didn't take any pictures of the deepest parts because were just worried about not falling on our butts at that point.








This is Chad trying to tough it out. I will admit it, I was the wimp in the group who wanted to turn around. Notice how far up it is wet on Chad's shorts and now add about 4 inches to that and you will get how high the water was on me. This is before the deepest part. Oh well, it was fun trying and an experience we will never forget. We are going to try to go back sometime this summer to hike the narrows and the subway.




When we turned around, we decided to hike Angel's landing instead. It was such an awesome hike! I would recommend it to anyone going to Zion's. It is mostly in the sun, so this is the perfect hike for the earlier months in the season. I would hate to be hiking that in 100 degree weather.

Chad and I found a cave on the way up to the top.










Chad and I at the very highest point - the actual "angel's landing."










Chad almost fell off!!











We had a great time at Zion's and we hope we get to finish what we started this summer! We went to Salem after that to spend some time with my family and especially with my grandpa since he was in poor health. All in all, it was a great spring break and exactly what I needed to relieve the stress from school!