Zion

From this point on, my travel style changed due to climate.  12 degree nights in the truck got pretty gnarly.  So I resolved to sleep on either side of the day, and travel at night.  As such, I spent a full day in some random city in California that I never bothered to look up.  This included Starbucks, McDonalds, Home Depot, and Walmart.  I figured I may as well endure it all in one fell swoop.  Left the area a couple hours before dark.  Stopped in a National Forest about 45 minutes before dark.  Another dweller pointed me in the direction of some fire roads to camp on, they were perfect and I caught a pretty sweet sunset.  Woke up at 12:00 AM to adopt the new travel style.  I then began my trek to Zion.  I stopped for a quick nap at some point through the night, and arrived to Zion about 9:00AM the next day.  It was still pretty cold. So I decided to make myself a nice hot breakfast and have some coffee before heading into the park.  I met this guy named Rod and he confirmed to me that I wanted to make the Observation Peak hike.  This was a relatively strenuous hike with constant elevation gain for about 4 miles.  So I left the truck around 12PM and hiked with effort for an hour and a half to make it to the top.  Covered in sweat, flanel tied at waist, weilding my walking staff, and sporting an ear to ear grin on my face, a woman said to me... "You look like a very happy man!" to which I replied, "I don't believe I could be more contented!"  Every ounce of effort was well worth it.  Sitting in a nook, pocket knife to walking stick, soaking it in.  I still have trouble believing the scale.  After a couple of hours of quiet contemplation I decided it was time to make my way down.  On the walk down, there were three big horned sheep pointed out to me.  I decided I really wanted to get a photo of this tough guy.  So I sized him up, and we had a staredown for approximately five minutes. At this point I admitted defeat, but not before snagging "the shot".  Made some dinner on the fly.  Headed to a National Forest to camp for a half-night.  Then proceeded to Bryce Canyon for my second respite and to meet back up with Rod the following afternoon and go for some hiking!