Zion Alternative

I’ll leave it to Anne to tell about our visit to Bryce and Zion National Parks. I was disappointed but not surprised by the experience at Zion. We visited in 1999 and I remember it as being by far the most crowded place we went. Looking at the numbers, visits have increased by over 50% since then. Zion Canyon is very small, with only one way in or out so the fundamental problem—too many people in too little space—can only be solved by severely limiting the number of people allowed in. And of course there’s no constituency for that. I plan to make my own little contribution to relieving overcrowding by never returning, unless it’s on a cold winter’s day sometime.

Assume for the moment that Zion is the best example of its type of canyon with towering walls and formations. As I drove home I wondered what the second-best example might be, and how many people visit there. I decided to ask ChatGPT when I got home. (You can see the full conversation here. ) Here’s what I asked:

I’m looking for a place to visit that is similar to Zion National Park, but without large crowds. It should be accessible by car or a short (less than one mile) hike and have similar scenic values. Can you suggest anything?

It suggested a number of places that sounded interesting, but most were further than we wanted to travel on our last day here. I asked for locations less than an hour-and-a-half away and the list got more interesting, including Red Hollow Slot Canyon, less than 15 minutes away! It turned out to be a beautiful canyon, although much smaller than Zion. But it was a nice hike, and while we encountered a few other hikers, it was nothing like the crowds everywhere we went in Zion. It was a short hike in a dry wash through fairly deep sand up to the slot part of the canyon, which was short—only a hundred yards or so.

I’ve tried using ChatGPT and some of the other AI chatbots before, but I’ve been underwhelmed. I’ve asked fairly technical questions about programming and genealogy and gotten answers that were seemingly helpful, plausible, but wrong. My experience here makes me think that maybe Anne and I should incorporate it into our trip planning process.

I also asked my original question about the second-best example of Zion’s type. Its answer:

If we take Zion Canyon to be the best example of its type—that is, a steep-walled, narrow canyon with towering red rock cliffs, sculpted by a desert river through Navajo sandstone, and accessible by scenic drives and hikes—then a strong case can be made that the second-best example is:
Grand Canyon of the Escalante (Utah) (especially the lower Escalante River Canyon area)

I guess I should add that to my list for our next visit!