General trip update

On Wednesday we did some awesome mountain biking on these trails near Moab (Bar-M trails). Our bikes were definitely a hindrance. My gears constantly slip, and Pat had shifting troubles with his. Our skills were rusty, too. That being said it was loads of fun, great quad workout, and we didn't get hurt.

We spent Thursday at Zion National Park, as can be seen from the pictures. We sort of threw this in at the very last second, because we had heard positive reviews from a lot of people. We spent the day doing a little hiking, a lot of biking on the road and trails, some museums, etc. We wanted to camp out in the park but every spot was booked. We could have camped outside of the park but we thought that was weak. Were planning to head to Vegas on Friday anyways, and we had a place to stay on Thursday, so we figured we might as well head out.

Once it got dark at Zion we left for a 2.5 hour drive to Vegas. Checked in, went out, played craps for a couple hours. Had six great drinks, and was only down 9 bucks at the end of the night, so I'd say I was a winner. We are going to be here tonight (Friday) and Saturday night, then on Sunday we are driving to Salt Lake City so that I can catch my flight home.

On an aside, I don't get how a national park can EVER run out of camping spots. We don't need a fire pit or running water, we don't need a designated area, and we don't need restrooms. We need a 20 x 20 patch of dirt to put our stuff on, and as it turns out, there is a LOT of land in these national parks. It is extremely annoying to me that they won't just let people set up wherever so long as they are experienced, respectful, and don't leave a trace. The essence of camping is to live among nature without nature knowing you are there. I'm resentful that I don't get to camp where I want because (I assume) some jackasses have left messes or caused problems in years past.

Here is what they should do. If you want to camp freely, you get a GPS tracker when you enter the park. The GPS tracker then establishes where your main campsite was. If you leave a mess, the park rangers figure out who did it and then you get a hefty ticket in the mail. I think I'm going to write a letter to the national park service and propose this solution.