60 Fun Facts About Zion National Park

Zion National Park is in which U.S. state?

Zion is in southwestern Utah, in Washington, Iron and Kane counties; it was the state's first national park and sits at the meeting point of three geographic provinces.

Which town sits at the park's south entrance and shares its territory with the park?

Springdale, a town of a few hundred residents, lies just outside the park's south entrance along State Route 9, and was settled by Mormon pioneers in 1862.

The North Fork of which watercourse carved Zion Canyon?

The North Fork of the Virgin River carved Zion Canyon; with a gradient of 50 to 80 feet per mile, it is one of the steepest streams in North America.

The canyon's reddish and tan walls are made of which rock formation?

The walls are Navajo Sandstone, Jurassic desert dunes turned to rock; the lower cliffs are stained red by iron oxides while the upper cliffs are bleached nearly white.

Roughly how deep is Zion Canyon at its deepest?

Zion Canyon reaches a depth of up to 2,640 feet, half a mile, along its 15-mile length, and in places its floor is barely wider than the river.

Which president first protected the canyon in 1909, as Mukuntuweap National Monument?

William Howard Taft proclaimed Mukuntuweap National Monument on 31 July 1909; Frederick Dellenbaugh's paintings, shown at the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair, and his Scribner's article had publicised the canyon.

Which explorer visited the canyon in 1872 and named it Mukuntuweap, believing it to be the Paiute name?

John Wesley Powell, leader of the Colorado River surveys, reached the canyon in 1872 and recorded its name as Mukuntuweap, thinking it the Paiute name; his photographer Jack Hillers made the first pictures of it.

Why did the Park Service push to rename the monument 'Zion' in 1918?

Acting NPS director Horace Albright drafted the proposal; the new name was one local Mormons already used.

In what year did Congress make Zion a national park?

Congress established Zion National Park in 1919 and Woodrow Wilson signed the act on 19 November that year, making it the state's first national park.

Which Mormon settler farmed the canyon floor from 1863 and is credited with naming it Zion?

Isaac Behunin built a cabin near the site of today's Zion Lodge in 1863, growing corn, tobacco and fruit trees, and is credited with calling the canyon Zion.

Which two Spanish padres passed near the Kolob Canyons in 1776, the first Europeans known in the area?

Trapper Jedediah Smith explored downstream stretches in 1825, and Mormon farmers arrived in the valley in 1847.

Which 1,488-foot rock fin, reached by a chain-lined trail cut in 1926, is the park's most famous hike?

Angels Landing, 1,488 feet above the canyon floor, was once called the Temple of Aeolus; a permit system for the chain-assisted final half mile above Scout Lookout began in April 2022.

What are Walter's Wiggles?

They are named for Walter Ruesch, the park's first superintendent, who built them in 1926.

Which threatened owl nests in Zion's narrow side canyons?

The Mexican spotted owl, federally listed as threatened in 1993, nests in the cool, narrow side canyons of Zion, where the park monitors its breeding pairs.

Which classic hike involves wading up the river between sandstone walls as little as 20 feet apart?

The Narrows follows the river itself, with walls up to a thousand feet high and as little as 20 feet apart; the full top-down route from Chamberlain's Ranch runs sixteen miles.

Which geologist descended and named the park's famous river gorge in 1872 as part of the Wheeler Survey?

Grove Karl Gilbert, a geologist with George Wheeler's 1872 survey, made the first recorded descent of the gorge and named it; Gilbert later became chief geologist of the US Geological Survey.

Which famous slot canyon lies on the Kolob Terrace side of the park?

The Subway is a tunnel-like section of the Left Fork of North Creek, reached from the Kolob Terrace Road; the top-down canyoneering route involves rappels and swims through cold pools.

Which span in the park's northwestern section is one of the longest natural arches in the world?

Kolob Arch spans 287.4 feet by a 2006 measurement, a few feet less than Landscape Arch in Arches National Park; reaching it from Lee Pass is a 14-mile round trip.

Where does the name 'Kolob' come from?

Settlers from Parowan and Cedar City used the Kolob country for timber and grazing from 1851.

The Kolob Canyons, a separate national monument from 1937, joined the park in what year?

Zion National Monument, proclaimed for the Kolob Canyons in 1937 by Franklin D. Roosevelt, was merged into Zion National Park in 1956, adding the red-walled Finger Canyons.

What is the most famous feature of the Zion-Mount Carmel Highway, opened in 1930?

Oversized vehicles need a permit and one-way traffic control to get through.

Which famous formation stands beside the highway near the park's east entrance?

Checkerboard Mesa, beside State Route 9 just inside the east entrance, gets its grid pattern from horizontal dune cross-bedding crossed by vertical fractures in the sandstone.

The road up Zion Canyon ends at a spot named for the Paiute coyote god — what is it called?

The Temple of Sinawava, a natural amphitheatre named for the Paiute coyote god, is the last stop on the canyon road; from there the paved Riverside Walk runs about a mile to the mouth of the gorge.

Since 2000, how do most visitors travel up Zion Canyon from spring to fall?

Since 2000 the park has run free propane-powered shuttle buses up the scenic drive while private cars are barred for most of the year; the system began after canyon traffic jams grew intolerable in the 1990s.

Which architect designed the rustic Zion Lodge, built in 1925 for the railroad-owned Utah Parks Company?

Gilbert Stanley Underwood, who later designed Bryce Canyon Lodge and the Ahwahnee in Yosemite, drew up the rustic Zion Lodge for the railroad's park company in 1925; it was rebuilt after a 1966 fire.

How many people were trapped at Zion Lodge when a 1995 landslide washed out the canyon road?

About 450 guests and employees were stranded at Zion Lodge when the April 1995 slide dammed the river and washed out the road; a one-lane emergency road was built within 24 hours.

Which 1969 Western filmed scenes in the park and at nearby Grafton ghost town?

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid used Zion and the nearby Grafton ghost town, where the bicycle scene was shot; silent Westerns such as 1924's The Deadwood Coach had filmed in the canyon decades earlier.

Which video game's 'Honest Hearts' expansion is set in Zion?

Fallout: New Vegas's 'Honest Hearts' expansion sends the player into a post-apocalyptic Zion Canyon, where tribal groups fight among the red cliffs; Obsidian Entertainment released it in May 2011.

Roughly what share of the park did the 2009 Omnibus Public Land Management Act designate as wilderness?

About 85% of the park, 124,406 of its roughly 146,600 acres, became the Zion Wilderness when Barack Obama signed the Omnibus Public Land Management Act in 2009.

Roughly how many visitors did the park attract in 2024?

Zion drew 4.95 million visitors in 2024, nearly 5 million, placing it among the busiest national parks in the United States despite covering only about 229 square miles.

Which large mammal was reintroduced to the park in 1973?

Desert bighorn sheep, which had vanished from the area, were reintroduced in 1973 and re-established a breeding population on the park's cliffs and slickrock, especially near the east entrance.

In 2014 the park confirmed the first successful breeding within its borders of which giant bird?

Golden eagles, peregrines and white-throated swifts also work the cliffs.

How many species of bat live in the park?

The park lists 289 bird species and four life zones: desert, riparian, woodland and coniferous forest.

Which small endemic fish swims in the park's riparian zones?

The Virgin spinedace, a small minnow endemic to the river system that drains the park, lives in its streams alongside flannelmouth suckers and bank beavers.

What is the highest point in the park?

Horse Ranch Mountain, 8,726 feet high in the Kolob Canyons section, is the park's summit; the park's total relief is roughly 5,100 feet.

Which farming culture grew corn in the Zion area until leaving by about 1300?

The Ancestral Puebloans, whose local branch archaeologists call the Virgin Anasazi, farmed corn, beans and squash here until about 1300, when drought and flooding probably drove them out.

Which large predator roams Zion, preying mainly on mule deer?

Mountain lions, also called cougars, range through the park and prey chiefly on mule deer; they are rarely seen but are the park's top predator.

Which Mormon missionary was guided into Zion Canyon by a Paiute in 1858 and founded Virgin?

Nephi Johnson, sent by Brigham Young to scout farmland, entered the canyon with a Paiute guide in 1858, reported favourably, and founded the town of Virgin later that year.

Entrepreneur David Flanigan built cableworks in 1900 to lower what from Cable Mountain into the canyon?

Flanigan's cable works lowered lumber milled on the plateau about 2,000 feet to the canyon floor, a trip of minutes instead of days by wagon; the draw works ran until 1927.

Which September 2015 disaster killed a party of seven in Keyhole Canyon?

A flash flood swept through Keyhole Canyon on 14 September 2015, killing all seven members of a canyoneering group; the same storm also killed people in nearby Hildale.

Which three geographic provinces meet at Zion?

Zion lies where the Colorado Plateau, the Great Basin and the Mojave Desert meet, on the edge of the Markagunt and Kolob plateaus; that junction explains its unusually varied plants and animals.

The park's nine rock formations belong to which great regional sequence of cliffs and layers?

Zion's layers form the middle step of the Grand Staircase, a sequence of cliffs climbing from the Grand Canyon to Bryce Canyon; regional uplift raised them more than 10,000 feet starting about 13 million years ago.

Which two campgrounds sit at the far southern end of the park?

South and Watchman campgrounds lie just inside the south entrance beside the river, within walking distance of the visitor centre; together they offer well over 200 sites.

Which 50-mile backpacking route links the Lee Pass trailhead in the northwest to the East Rim trailhead?

The Zion Traverse strings together the LaVerkin Creek, Hop Valley, Wildcat Canyon, West Rim and East Rim trails for roughly 48 miles across the park, from Lee Pass to the east boundary.

Which environmental technology at the Zion Canyon visitor centre uses passive cooling towers?

The visitor centre's cooling towers are windcatchers: air entering at the top passes over wet pads, cools by evaporation and sinks into the building; a Trombe wall stores winter heat.

Which railroad's subsidiary, the Utah Parks Company, developed early tourism at Zion?

The Union Pacific formed the subsidiary in 1923 and ran rail-and-bus loop tours from a railhead in the state's southwest through Zion, Bryce Canyon and the Grand Canyon's North Rim.

Which 0.4-mile Zion Canyon trail ends at an alcove of hanging gardens?

Weeping Rock's 0.4-mile paved trail climbs to an alcove where groundwater seeps out along the base of the cliff, feeding hanging gardens of columbine and maidenhair fern.

Which paved trail is the only one in Zion open to bicycles and leashed dogs?

The Pa'rus Trail, a 3.5-mile round trip paved path along the river from the visitor centre to Canyon Junction, is Zion's only trail open to bicycles and leashed dogs; its name is Paiute for bubbling water.

What is the lowest point in Zion National Park, at 3,666 feet?

Coal Pits Wash, 3,666 feet above sea level in the park's arid southwestern corner, is Zion's lowest point; the park's total relief is about 5,100 feet.

How long is the scenic drive up Zion Canyon from Canyon Junction to its end?

The Zion Canyon Scenic Drive runs about 6 miles from Canyon Junction to the road's end, passing the lodge, the Grotto and Big Bend, and is closed to private cars for most of the year.

What was the name of Zion Canyon's first visitor lodging, a 1917 tent operation?

Wylie Camp, a tent camp opened by William Wylie in 1917, was the canyon's first tourist lodging; a railroad-owned park company took it over in 1923 and replaced it with Zion Lodge.

The Kolob Canyons section of the park is reached from which interstate highway?

I-15 (Interstate 15) exit 40 leads straight to the Kolob Canyons visitor centre and the 5-mile scenic road that ends at a viewpoint over the Finger Canyons.

Under the Köppen system, what climate type does Zion National Park have?

Zion's climate is cold semi-arid, BSk in the Köppen system: hot summers, cool winters with occasional snow on the canyon floor, and modest precipitation spread thinly through the year.

In which month is precipitation normally heaviest at Zion?

March is normally Zion's wettest month, as Pacific storms sweep in during the unpredictable spring; June is the driest, before the late-summer monsoon thunderstorms.

Zion's spring wildflower bloom peaks in which month?

Wildflowers bloom from April through June and peak in May, when columbine, penstemon and paintbrush colour the canyon floor and its seeps.

Which rancher improved the Echo Canyon footpath in 1896, creating the future East Rim Trail?

John Winder, a local rancher, widened the old Native footpath up Echo Canyon in 1896; his route up to the East Rim was used four years later for the Cable Mountain works.

Zion's third, primitive campground sits at which viewpoint off the Kolob Terrace Road?

Lava Point, off the Kolob Terrace Road, holds a small primitive campground and a viewpoint across the whole park, and is the starting point of the West Rim Trail.

Stunted forests on Zion's mid-elevation slopes pair pinyon pine with which other tree?

Juniper joins pinyon pine in the stunted pinyon-juniper woodland between about 3,900 and 5,500 feet, with manzanita, cliffrose, serviceberry, scrub oak and yucca among them.

Roughly how long is the round trip on foot to the park's great natural arch?

The 14-mile round trip from Lee Pass along La Verkin Creek to the arch takes about 8 hours; the neighbouring Taylor Creek trail, 5 miles, takes about half as long.

The Kolob Canyons section of Zion lies closest to which Utah town?

Mormon settlers of Cedar City and Parowan used the Kolob Canyons for timber and grazing from 1851.