Wedding Locale Hunting in Zion + Photos from Bryce Canyon & Capitol Reef National Parks

Lafayette, CO - Ok, for these photos we go back to the weekend of February 16th. Before the gas prices went really crazy, Suwei and I took a road trip out to Zion National Park to scope out potential sites for our wedding in September. This time, unlike our last trip to Zion in November, we managed to stay on task for most of the first day and a half.

In order to have a wedding inside the National Park boundaries, one must apply for a wedding permit with the National Park Service. In Zion there are only a few locales where the Park Service allows larger gatherings. Our fist chilly morning out, we were able to quickly narrow down the selection to two choices. The Temple of Sinawava at the end of the valley (where the Narrows Trail pops out) was our favorite, but they only allow up to 30 people. We didn't want to have to pick and choose which friends to invite, so we settled on our second favorite, the lawn in front of the lodge. Although it looked a bit barren in February, I remember that part of the park being quite spectacular in the fall. Settled.

Our next task was to find a place to hold the reception. Now, when we say reception, we don't really mean "reception" in the traditional sense. BBQ would probably be a more appropriate description for what we have in mind. White table clothes, fancy dinnerware, the ching chinging of crystal being replaced by dusty truck beds, camp chairs, a couple of Webers and possibly a keg or few (if we can work that out in Utah). Although we planned on reserving two group campsites inside the park for backup, ideally we were looking for a wilder setting outside the park where we could do as we like. The thought of toning it down after 10 pm didn't rub us the right way. So, we started scoping out every muddy track leading out of Springdale, Virgin and Hurricane. It being February, most of them were made practically impassible by plenty of mud and snow. We saw a lot of nice spots but, to this date, we still haven't fully committed to a site. However, Gooseberry Mesa is high on our list. We're going to put a little more effort into the wedding planning after the canoe trip next weekend.

View from Gooseberry Mesa

With the wedding stuff out of the way we made our way home slowly via Kolob Canyon, Bryce Canyon National Park and Capitol Reef National Park. This is where most of the decent photos were taken.

Bryce Canyon National Park

Capitol Reef National Park

Here is the link to the slide show:

Zion, Bryce, & Capitol Reef National Parks, UT