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I went to Barcelona for business but took some time to be a tourist with my wife beforehand. I’ll post pages with pics as I get to it, and all will be linked through this post. Day 1 – Roman Ruins Day 2 – Sagrada Familia Exterior Day 2 – Sagrada Familia Interior Day 3 – Park Guell Day 4 – La Pedrera  The interior of Sagrada Familia is as impressive as the exterior! It is enormously tall with lots of light from the extensive stained glass.       The design of the interior is based on a forest of trees. You can see how the columns split into branches that support the very tall roof. The stained glass on one side is orange and red and yellow for summer and fall, while the other side has blue and green, representing winter and spring.  Gaudi modeled the structure with strings and weights to determine where to place the columns. He hung his model upside down – a remarkably ingenious approach to the engineering well before modern structural analysis existed.       The stained glass is all modern, and contains references to saints from around the world. In the 3rd picture above, you can see seating for the choir that surrounds the main area of the basilica.   The crucifix above the altar leaves nothing to the imagination, making it very clear how painful and terrible crucifixion was.   Lighted symbology on the columns around the altar.    Statues within the basilica. The last one is dedicated to St. George, the patron saint of Catalonia.   The crypt, beneath the main chapel was the first item completed and is still in use today for mass. Gaudi’s tomb is also in the crypt. The organ pipes were near the viewing area of the crypt. The plan is to add lots more organ pipes to fill the basilica with sound.   Furniture where accessories for mass can be stored.  The Basilica of Sagrada Familia is one of the most iconic landmarks in Barcelona. We had tickets for a guided tour and the trip up the Nativity tower for the morning of our second day in Barcelona. We’d seen pictures, of course, but nothing prepares you for the real view as we emerged from the subway station to see the view shown above!       The basilica has been under construction since 1882 and was Gaudi’s masterpiece. Gaudi died tragically in 1926, so he didn’t see much of it done. He created samples and designs for those that followed to use in his stead, but civil wars and uprisings destroyed many of them and damaged the building a few times. You can see the ornate designs in the images above. The fruit at the tops of the roof depict what was available in the holy land. Each of the large towers represents a member of the Sacred Family, including the Apostles, the Evangelists, the Virgin Mary, and the largest one in the center, Jesus. The plan is to finish the Jesus tower, the largest one, by the 100th anniversary of Gaudi’s death next year.          The tour group met at the base of the Nativity Facade, though we didn’t understand much of the symbolism at the time. We were just amazed at the ornate sculpture that made up the facade.  The tour guide took us to the model of the how the building will look when it is completed in 2033. Click the image to see it closer. You can see how enormous the Jesus tower will be!          The tour guide showed us how this Nativity facade showed the birth and life of Jesus. Animals also played a major role in the facade. We can see the two turtles that are supporting the columns as well as the two geckos on the wall. Then we entered the ornate doorway to the interior of the basilica. I have so many interior pictures, I will make that a separate post.            The tour then exited to the Passion facade, which we stayed pretty close to because of the pouring rain. This facade was done by a more modernist artist, so many angles and flat surfaces, but as stunning as the other side. The Passion facade depicts the stations of the cross. It also has a large statue of Jesus struggling with the cross in front of the stunning doors. Above it all, we see a gold Jesus ascending into heaven.      A few more pics, some from outside the fence. The amount of detail is incredible – everywhere you look, there is something meaningful. Notice also that Gaudi didn’t like purely vertical columns. He used columns with angles to help support the building.   Sadly, the rain started coming down pretty hard as we were inside the basilica, so we weren’t able to go up the Nativity tower. The towers have an elevator up, but the only way down is 400 steps, so they didn’t want to have people slipping. Of course, Apple’s Weather app swore that not only wasn’t it raining, but there had been no rain.  We arrived in Barcelona in the morning, got to our hotel, then, after a quick nap, set out to explore. Our hotel was in a fantastic location, half a block to Placa de Catalunya, often called the center of town. We walked La Rambla, a huge street from the plaza to the harbor. Because of all the construction and the huge crowds, not to mention the jet lag, I didn’t take any pictures of La Rambla. I’m not used to walking in such crowded conditions, so wasn’t thinking of pictures.  At the end of La Rambla is a monument to Christopher Columbus. He is beloved in Spain because he brought back lots of treasure from his voyage of exploration.   After a walk back up La Rambla and through a huge market full of stalls selling nearly any kind of food and ingredients, we headed for the Museum of History, which contains the ruins of the ancient Roman walled city of Barcino. Walking through the narrow alleys and around the 13th century cathedral was fantastic.       The History Museum is terrific and well worth a visit! First, we went through the “modern” history of Barcelona, where it was a textile manufacturing powerhouse and capital of Catalunya, involved in several wars and uprisings. From a viewpoint at the top of the museum, we could look out at the Gothic Quarter and beautiful nearby buildings. The plaza shown in the 4th picture turns out to be more important than it appears. The Roman ruins, roads, and city walls of ancient Barcino were discovered under that plaza. Each generation in Barcino built over top of what existed before, then as the city expanded, a church and much more were built on top. The ruins were excavated early last century, so from the museum, we went down underground and saw the ancient roads, shops, and more. The laser lines in the photos show the road boundaries, while other photos show wine-making vats and walls of 2000 year-old buildings.         The patterns and tiles were still clearly visible in some areas, which is remarkable!  As we left the museum, we exited into the plaza above the ruins. The plaza took on a whole new meaning for us once we saw what was underneath. Artificial Intelligence is pretty fun stuff, but the promises of it being a time saver aren’t always true. I typically use Microsoft’s Copilot and before that Bing’s version of ChatGPT (though I admit to owning a Rabbit R1, which is cute but not as useful as I’d hoped). I’ve asked Copilot for help with programming issues, and while it often provides helpful answers, sometimes it comes back with code examples that are hopelessly broken or way out of date. I recently wrote a post on LinkedIn to talk about Hiperwall‘s commitment to supporting our customers and our success at doing so. I wrote the following two paragraphs: From the start, Hiperwall saw the value of responsive and effective technical support. Whether it is a system configuration question, problems with a firewall, or PC issues, our Technical Services team will leap into action to help. I have invariably heard high praise for the responsiveness and thoroughness of our team from both customers and partners. We have recently renamed and refocused our ongoing “maintenance” services as HiperCare to reflect our commitment to keeping your Hiperwall video wall working for you. If you are looking for a video wall product, know that you will be well-supported with Hiperwall. If you have a Hiperwall system, make sure your HiperCare is up-to-date so you get the best in support and the latest software features. On a whim, I asked Copilot to make it more impactful, which resulted in: From the very beginning, Hiperwall has recognized the critical importance of responsive and effective technical support. Whether it’s a system configuration query, firewall issue, or PC problem, our Technical Services team springs into action to assist. Customers and partners consistently praise our team’s responsiveness and thoroughness. We have recently rebranded and enhanced our ongoing maintenance services as HiperCare, underscoring our dedication to keeping your Hiperwall video wall operating seamlessly. If you’re in the market for a video wall product, rest assured that Hiperwall offers unparalleled support. For existing Hiperwall users, ensure your HiperCare is current to receive top-tier support and the latest software features. I liked what Copilot did, but it was a bit too “marketing speak” for me and didn’t sound like something I would write. Some of the words and phrases it came up with, while succinct and correct, were ones I would not use. Since my goal was to speak from the heart, that wouldn’t do. So I spent a while integrating some bits of the AI rewritten paragraphs with my own and ended up with the following. Much of the time was debating with my wife over “will leap into action” vs. “springs into action”. I ended up liking the latter for brevity and energy. From the very beginning, Hiperwall has recognized the critical importance of responsive and effective technical support. Whether it’s a system configuration question, firewall issue, or PC glitch, our Technical Services team springs into action to assist. Customers and partners consistently praise our team’s responsiveness and thoroughness. We have recently rebranded and enhanced our ongoing maintenance services as HiperCare, underscoring our dedication to keeping your Hiperwall video wall operating effectively. If you’re in the market for a video wall product, know that you will be well-supported with Hiperwall. For existing Hiperwall users, ensure your HiperCare is current to receive top-tier support and the latest software features. In the end, AI did punch up the writing a bit, but it didn’t save me any time. In fact, it took more time to review and rewrite than I should have spent on it. In the end, my original text would have gotten the point across and probably wouldn’t have embarrassed me. I should have just used it. But playing with AI is fun! Video walls come in various shapes and sizes for many different uses. From Control Rooms to Collaboration Rooms and from Education to Digital Signage, video walls show information at a large scale to convey important data and help solve problems or, in the case of digital signage, influence people. Small video walls can be driven by a single device, but also cannot display much information. Larger video walls need to be driven by multiple graphics pipelines in some sort of scalable architecture. This article explores how sources and other content are ingested and displayed in scalable video wall systems. While the concepts are general to the field, specific examples will use the Hiperwall scalable architecture and its video wall software components. Because of Hiperwall’s focus on Command and Control as well as many forms of Collaboration, the examples will be taken from those domains rather than Digital Signage, though Hiperwall is often used for large-scale Digital Signage video walls. In this post, I will:
Scalable Video Wall Systems DefinedA scalable video wall system means that multiple input channels and graphics pipelines drive content on the video wall displays and that their number and capability grow as the system grows or the display size increases. Whether the large video wall display is many LCD panels arranged together or a direct-view LED system consisting of many tiles driven by several LED controllers, multiple graphics pipelines are required to deliver content to the screens. Many video wall systems consist of more than one video wall connected to the system and sometimes even satellite displays distributed throughout the facility. The ability to handle many (hundreds, at least) sources of information and display them simultaneously on video walls comprised of tens or even hundreds of displays is a critical requirement for large scale video wall systems, and only scalable systems can meet it. In the figure below, a scalable video wall system is driven by PCs running Hiperwall video wall software. The figure shows the video wall displays driven by a pair of “HiperView” computers that decode and draw the content on the screens, in this case LCDs, but LED controllers are just as applicable. Some people call these “players,” but that vastly understates their capability, so I will stick with “display computers” or HiperView computers. Several “HiperSource” input computers capture many kinds of source content for display on the video wall. Much more information about this approach will be explored in a later section of this article. Finally, several control points, including fault tolerant HiperController PCs and the powerful, easy-to-use HiperOperator PCs provide customers the ability to manipulate content in real-time and control the video wall system. All these components, each running on commodity PCs, are tied together by a powerful commercial-quality Ethernet network switch. Because all content in a Hiperwall system is “just data,” whether it be video streams, screen captures, or high-resolution web content, the full bisection bandwidth of a properly configured network switch is sufficient to deliver hundreds of content and source items to hundreds of displays or LED controllers.  Advantages of Scalable Video Wall SystemsCost-effectiveness is one of the primary advantages of scalable video wall systems, for several reasons:
Another significant advantage of scalable video wall systems over non-scalable ones is capability/capacity. By adding computing power and graphics processing as the system scales, this increases the capacity of the system to accept and display content. If a video wall display system is large enough to display hundreds of video streams or other content, then the processing power driving that display system needs to be up to the task. Scalable video wall designs like Hiperwall fit the bill because their capability grows as the system grows. Each new HiperView computer adds capacity to decode more streams and drive more pixels on the displays. Using HiperView Quantum, the playback of all that content is synchronized between all the computers and, more importantly, between the displays, so even the largest LED video wall will not show tearing between LED controller boundaries. Content Types for Scalable Video Wall SystemsA previous Hiperwall article describes the many uses of control room video wall systems and the content types they show. I will not repeat all that information here, but in summary, we differentiate between two content types: stored and dynamic.
Scalable video wall systems have exceptional advantages and some challenges with displaying content. The largest advantage is that each display computer (HiperView in the Hiperwall example) only needs to render the content that is visible on the pixel space (displays or LED controllers) it is driving. This is an extreme advantage over other video wall systems when many content items are present. Instead of rendering the tens or hundreds of video streams on the entire video wall, a single display computer may only need to render 4 or 8 or 16 and then display the result. This is a significant component of the scalability advantage. This also comes into play with extremely large imagery. Instead of having to decode and render every byte of a gigapixel image, a scalable display computer only needs to decode and render just what is visible in its pixel space. This allows Hiperwall systems to interactively show, move, and manipulate gigapixel images with ease. A challenge scalable distributed video wall systems have is because content that is shared between the pixel space of two different display computers is rendered and drawn by both those computers. For many reasons ranging from how busy each computer is to out-of-sync vertical refresh timing, the appearance of tearing could occur at the boundary if one computer renders the content later than the other one. With LCD displays, this effect is typically not very visible, partially because the bezel separation makes it less obvious. On LED systems, it can be distracting, so Hiperwall’s HiperView Quantum technology uses software and hardware to synchronize content playback to prevent tearing. Reliability of Scalable Video Wall SystemsAnother recent Hiperwall article explores architectural approaches to take advantage of the distributed nature of Hiperwall to greatly enhance reliability of the video wall system. Summarizing, various levels of partitioning the system into multiple regions and then adding inexpensive redundancy greatly enhances system reliability and fault tolerance. Two HiperControllers means if one gets disconnected, the other takes over. Partitioning the video wall into segments and driving each with separate display computers (and LED controllers if an LED wall) means only a small portion of the video wall fails if something happens to that computer or its connection. Driving different inputs of the displays or LED controllers with hot standby computers means the video wall keeps running even in the face of a display computer failure. Even the network switch can be redundant. These and other techniques make reliability and content integrity of a Hiperwall system cost effective to engineer from the start. Source Input and Display in Scalable Video Wall SystemsSo far, we have seen how a scalable video wall system can be used to show lots of content, including live or dynamic content, but what is this dynamic content and how do we get it into the system? Dynamic content is not stored content, so it is being generated in real-time by something and needs to be shown with minimal delay to be relevant. Depending on the type of content, that delay can be measured in milliseconds or maybe a few seconds, but timeliness is a key constraint on dynamic content usage. Source Typesto come from an external source, such content is often called a “source” which is the term used for the rest of this article. If the video wall is in a security operations center (SOC), the most common source type is a surveillance camera feed. These feeds can come directly from IP cameras, or via a VMS system like Genetec or Milestone, or even a raw video feed digitized or converted by a video capture device. In the first two cases, the source likely arrives at any video wall system as a compressed stream such as H.264 and must be decompressed to use it. For the capture device case, unless the capture device does compression in hardware, the video will arrive as frames, requiring high memory throughput to manage and use. Other types of control rooms often need the output from specialized applications like SCADA systems or other monitoring systems to be shown on the video wall. Since these applications run on a computer, a screen capture type of source can be used to capture the state of the application and show it on the video wall. In other cases, the output of the computer can be fed via HDMI or other video cable into a capture device for display on the video wall. Many control rooms are seeing a rise in the use of web applications, including GIS systems, maps, social media and news feeds, and web-based dashboards that show the current status of a process or system, such as data center monitoring. Web sources are different because they have no predefined shape or frame rate. A social media feed may only update every few seconds or even minutes, while traffic maps may update even less frequently. Maps showing emergencies may need to update within a second of data coming in. Unlike video streams or HDMI captures, web sources may have very unusual aspect ratios, possibly being very tall or wide, or can be much higher resolution than any typical display. This means the video wall system must be able to display web sources at sizes and shapes that match the source material, or else the view will be distorted or unreadable. While the topic here is “video” walls, audio often plays an important role. News and weather feeds, as well as camera streams, may have audio that can provide information in a crisis situation. Therefore, the video wall system needs mechanisms to play that audio, as required, and adjust the volume of each source or content item as well as the output volume of each display computer. Therefore, if a control room operator needs to hear the audio associated with a specific source on the wall, the operator can unmute the content and turn up the volume on the display computer so the room can hear the audio. Source Ingestion for DisplayGetting all these sources into a video wall system is an important component of the system design. Some of them, like IP camera feeds, are on the network, thus many of them can come into the system via a simple network cable. Others, like analog and digital video signals, require capture devices with ports to accept the signal and a connection to the rest of the video wall system so the video feed can be shown. Web page sources also arrive via the network but may require complicated rendering before they can be shown on the video wall. In all cases, some level of processing and data transfer is required to show live sources on a video wall. Designing a scalable approach to accept these sources is a significant part of specifying a scalable video wall system. Hiperwall uses several different “HiperSource” applications running on commodity PCs to ingest or create source feeds to show on the video wall. Each of these applications connects to the HiperController to identify the available sources, including their resolution, encoding, and more, so they can be listed in the content list to be selected and displayed on the video wall. Each HiperSource application also provides periodic thumbnails for each of its connected sources, so system operators can preview what the source shows before putting it on the video wall. While this can be a computationally expensive operation, this preview feature is an essential component of Hiperwall’s powerful but friendly HiperController software UI. The latest HiperOperator content list can show multiple such source previews at once, all periodically updating, so the user knows exactly what they will see when the content is sent to the video wall. HiperSource IP Streams is the application that handles incoming IP camera feeds (including ONVIF support), encoder box streams, and many other video streams. Each HiperSource IP Streams application can manage up to 75 streams on a single commodity computer, and multiple such IP Streams computers can work together, so a Hiperwall system supports hundreds of simultaneously available streams. And because of Hiperwall’s scalable design, those streams can all be shown at once, up to the limits of the hardware. This means even small Hiperwall systems can easily have hundreds of streams available and show tens or hundreds at once. HiperSource Streamer and the new Streamer+ handle high resolution, high frame rate video captures and deliver them to the Hiperwall system. While Streamer and Streamer+ have different commodity hardware requirements, both can capture and send the screen of their PC at high frame rate to the video wall. Both can also use readily available capture cards to capture incoming video feeds to send to the system. They take advantage of hardware-based video compression to deliver high quality, low bandwidth source streams to the video wall. Multiple screen captures and video captures can be used simultaneously. Both also offer KVM (Keyboard, Video, Mouse) control of the Streamer PC when capturing the screen, so operators on the HiperControllers or HiperOperators can interact with the PC. HiperSource Browser is a powerful Chromium-based web browser that delivers web content to the Hiperwall system at very high resolution (over 200 million pixels) for extremely high-quality maps, dashboards, social media feeds, PDFs, and more. The application supports Hiperwall’s patented Multi-Active browser tabs, so a single Browser PC can deliver several high quality web pages to the system simultaneously. HiperSource Browser also supports KVM control so HiperController and HiperOperator users can interact with the web pages as needed. HiperSource Sender is a cross-platform screen capture application. It captures all or part of a computer’s desktop and delivers it to the video wall. It can send multiple portions of the desktop at once, to allow a user to only share data that is needed. It uses CPU-based compression and runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux, even in Virtual Machines, so is perfect for SCADA applications, small dashboards, and proprietary applications. Sender supports KVM control, so HiperController and HiperOperator users can control the Sender PC, if needed. The HiperSource IP Streams and Streamer(+) applications take advantage of network features only provided within the LAN, so they must be on the Hiperwall subnet and connected to the Hiperwall switch. HiperSource Browser and Sender, however, can deliver their feeds via TLS-encrypted and authenticated connections, thus they can be outside the LAN and even outside the country. This remote source mechanism of Sender and Browser enables a powerful HiperSource sharing capability called HiperCast. HiperCast allows multiple HiperSource Sender and Browser sources to be shared with several Hiperwall video wall systems around the world. This facilitates data sharing and a common operating picture for organizations distributed across geographic locations. Scalability and Design for ReliabilityHaving multiple source applications running on a few separate PCs seems natural for scalability, but it can also enhance system reliability as well. For example, if a system needs 50 IP camera streams, a single HiperSource IP Streams computer can handle sending all 50 streams to the video wall, but if someone accidentally kicks the plug on that PC, all 50 streams disconnect. Using 2 HiperSource IP Streams PCs adds only a small incremental hardware cost and no additional Source license cost, yet if one fails, only the streams connected to it go offline. With one of the VMS plugins that work with the most popular VMS systems, it is quick and easy to transition those disconnected streams to the other IP Streams computer while the failed one is repaired. Such transfers can also be done via the HiperInterface web services-style control interface. Similarly, HiperSource Streamer and Streamer+ work with multi-port capture cards, and Streamer+ is regularly used to stream 4 or 8 video captures from a single PC, but if that PC fails, those 8 streams go offline. Splitting the capture capacity between several Streamer+ PCs adds a little to the hardware cost but provides easier failure recovery and lessens the impact if something does fail, again with no additional source license cost. The Hiperwall software also has some built-in features to help with source reliability. First, if a source disconnects unexpectedly, that event is logged. Also, the locations where instances of that source were visible on the video wall are remembered, so if the source reconnects, it will be automatically shown in the same places again. Another important reliability feature is HiperFailSafe content. This content type is useful if there is an extremely important content item that must be shown even with failures present. As an example, if the weather report is critically important to the operation of a control room, a stream of a weather channel can be shown via HiperSource IP Streams. But what if the cable goes out or the capture device fails? Well, a different feed of the channel through a different provider can be shown via Streamer. What if that fails too? A web page showing the weather can be shown via HiperSource Browser. HiperFailSafe content lets an operator define which sources or other content items are related along with their priority, so the video streams have higher priority than the web page version of the weather report. Then, the Hiperwall system shows the highest priority item in that list that is available, so if one fails, it will automatically switch to the next one. Of course, multiple HiperFailSafe content items can be defined and used simultaneously. So together, hardware redundancy and software features can greatly enhance video wall system reliability. Security and Integrity ApproachesSecurity and Integrity are important constraints in many mission critical environments, particularly because Hiperwall uses software applications to capture source feeds and deliver them to the video wall. It may be that security constraints prevent certain sensitive source computers from connecting to the Hiperwall LAN, or perhaps the application being captured is sensitive and integrity requirements prevent other software from running with it. The easiest way to solve those problems is to use a capture card or an encoder box that simply captures the HDMI output of that PC so it can be turned into a source for the Hiperwall video wall. This provides complete separation of the sensitive PC and the Hiperwall system. Since Hiperwall software does not store captured source streams, no sensitive data can be retained by the system when the video wall is not in operation. This means the integrity of the source PC is maintained, the security of the data on the PC is not impacted, and yet its output can be shown on the video wall. The Hiperwall team and partners have white papers and other guidance for system security and integrity. Robust SupportThe Hiperwall software and system architecture is designed to be easy to install and manage, but properly specifying a system takes practice. Our closest partners have exactly that expertise and are able to help design and specify a scalable Hiperwall system to meet the needs of just about any customer. The Hiperwall Technical Services team is readily available to apply their experience to scalable Hiperwall system designs as well. It is important to us that our customers know they do not have to do things alone – they will have support in designing and specifying the system, installing and configuring the software, and maintaining and upgrading in the future. The last stop on our Autoventure was Cedar Breaks National Monument. We stayed in Cedar City, UT, and took the short 20-ish mile drive up to Cedar Breaks with a bit of road construction to slow us down. The park seems not to be very well known despite the spectacular scenery. It looks a lot like a mini Bryce Canyon, yet all above 10,000 feet! It is closed in winter, and nearby Brian Head has several ski areas which looked nice. The main visitor center was closed, but a temporary visitor center and store was set up just near the park entrance. We stopped at the Sunset View Overlook for our first view of the amazing geologic formation below.     We then drove through an alpine meadow to stop at Chessmen Ridge Overlook for even more spectacular views.        We went on to the North View Overlook to see everything from yet another angle. 
  After a picnic lunch at the campground, we headed back to the Chessmen Ridge Overlook parking to take the Alpine Trail, a loop that took us to an algae-filled lake. We took the upper trail first and got to walk on snow for the first time in many years. The upper trail was fairly easy, but a number of trees had fallen and were blocking the trail, and the path down to the lake and lower trail was steep, muddy, and had lots of snow.     The lower trail was a fair bit more treacherous than the upper trail, with more fallen trees, more snow, and lots of mud. But, it was close to the edge of the canyon, so we got amazing views on the return journey.     We left Zion Canyon and Springdale and drove North on I-15 to Kolob Canyons. This is a lesser-known area of Zion National Park and was not at all crowded but is beautiful and offers nice hiking and picnicking. Our first stop after entering the park gave us great views of massive rock faces and deep valleys. Unfortunately, with all the sunscreen I was applying, I seem to have smeared the lens on my phone, so many of my pics from Kolob Canyons have artifacts, as can be seen in the right pic below.   From this viewpoint, we could see the road heading up and around.   We drove quite a distance along the road, past trailheads and small overlooks to get to the Kolob Canyon’s Viewpoint. Here we got spectacular views of enormous rock faces, as this panoramic view shows.      We then took the Timber Creek Overlook trail, a short, not too difficult trail that led to a high point with great views for many miles.     While it wasn’t nearly as hot at Kolob Canyons as it was in Zion Canyon, it was still pretty hot, so shade was important!  Once we reached the end of the trail, we could see distant ranges, but also could look back at the rocks across the valley from the trailhead. It was a beautiful hike!      We visited Zion National Park over 2 days, with the first day in Zion Canyon. Because of overcrowding, shuttle buses take visitors up the canyon road to the various trailheads and sightseeing destinations. Even the buses were crowded when we visited, with lines to get on the bus, standing room only onboard, and lots of people at each stop. The photo below shows the line when we arrived, but I’m sure it only got worse for the next couple hours.  A problem we encountered was the closure of the bridge at Zion Lodge to get across to the Emerald Pools trailhead. I had the brilliant idea that we would start our hike at The Grotto, visit the Emerald Pools, then hike past the bridge that was out of commission, and get back to the road at the Court of the Patriarchs. This added a couple miles to the hike, but how bad could it be? It was bad. It was over a hundred degrees F, I am pretty out of shape, and the trail markings are terrible (more on that later). Luckily we brought plenty of water, including my fancy new hydration backpack, which had a bite-and-suck mechanism to drink, which doesn’t work that well when one is struggling for breath. It doesn’t work that well for me, in my opinion, but I don’t exactly have a better idea. Plus the water tasted very plasticky, despite my attempts to clean the thing beforehand.       In any case, we set off with our hiking poles and water and made it to the lower, then the middle Emerald Pools, but were pretty beat at that point. So, we started heading down the trail to the broken Lodge bridge. At that point, the heat was getting to us, but there was no way we were going back up to the Emerald Pools to get back to The Grotto. We should have. Instead, we followed the last sign we saw on the trail. It pointed us towards the Court of the Patriarchs a couple miles away via a horse trail. We saw people wading across the river and decided we didn’t want to do that, we’d find a perfectly fine bridge after a long walk. There was a lot less shade along this trail, particularly with the midday sun overhead, so it was quite punishing. Sure there were spectacular views, but who can appreciate them when you’re exhausted?     As we traveled south, the trail finally split, with one heading left towards the river and (hopefully) the Court of the Patriarchs. No, it just had even less shade and eventually met back up with the other trail, so we made our journey a bit longer and more miserable. With the lack of signage, we had no idea how much farther we had to go. And there was no cell reception, so maps wouldn’t load. (Yes, I had downloaded the map in the National Park app, and that would have helped, but in my exhaustion, I forgot). We could see the Court of the Patriarchs by that point, and once again, there were people wading across the river at a shallow point, so we decided to do the same. Had we known that walking another 1/3 mile might have taken us to a bridge, we would have done that, but again, no signs on the trails. We caught the shuttle back to the visitor center, with the intention of going back to the hotel to rest, but by a happy accident, we got on the wrong shuttle and went back up the canyon. We stopped off at Zion Lodge for a well deserved rest and several bottles of the most spectacular tasting expensive water ever. And the view!  We spent a couple nights in Springdale near the entrance to Zion National Park. The town is nestled in a valley with spectacular views all around. These were from the window of the hotel room.   As we arrived at the hotel, a tour bus full of people arrived too. The next morning, the breakfast seating area was completely full of those tourists who seem to have set their alarm clock to the same time I did. Therefore, I had to sit outside on the deck. As you can see, I wasn’t suffering at all. 😄  There are loads of hotels along the highway in Springdale, and a very convenient bus runs the length of them and right to the entrance of the park. We and many others boarded the bus just near the hotel and, after 4 more stops, it dropped us at the park, which I’ll cover in another post. We had a terrific dinner at the Bit and Spur, which has both indoor and outdoor seating. We chose to eat outside, because it had cooled into the 90s by that point in the evening and there was a pleasant breeze. The drinks were moderately priced, the service was great, and the food was delicious, including these yummy sweet potato tamales, one pork and one mushroom.  |
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