Snow-frosted Zion — Winter casts park under its magical spell

SPRINGDALE, Washington County — When morning temperatures hover around 20 degrees and even the Virgin River bottomlands are under a white blanket, with drifting snow and crunchy ice prompting the few drivers on the road to be extra-cautious, you know you are in Zion National Park at a special moment.

"I always try to get into the canyon to look for new shots when it snows," says David Pettit, a professional photographer based in Springdale, at the park's west entrance. That's especially true when the skies subsequently clear.

"The way the blue sky is scrubbed so clean after a storm, and the way lingering clouds cling to the peaks, always makes me think of a Shangri-La," Pettit says.

Utah has been blasted by winter storm after winter storm the past few weeks. They have targeted the state from multiple directions: north, northwest, west, southwest….

And Zion, which regularly sees snow atop its famed monoliths, cliffs and rims but rarely gets more than a trace or an inch or two in its famed canyon, didn't escape the onslaught.

"Usually we don't get storms this big," says Tom Haraden, assistant chief of interpretation and visitor services at Zion, which in 2009 is celebrating a century as a park. "Obviously, when you see snow at Lake Mead, snow on the Vegas Strip — that's pretty rare."

Recently, spots deep in Zion Canyon received perhaps 6 or more inches, while the park's east entrance, 1,700 feet higher than the canyon floor, got a foot, Haraden says.

Then, as is more typical, it rained, which partially melted and compacted the snow, he said.

Zion Canyon sees snow "two, three, four times a winter, but it usually melts off pretty fast — and photographers come out pretty quick to take pictures. I have seen a big snowstorm like this," says Haraden, who has been at Zion for 11 years, "but it's not the rule; it's the exception to the rule."

These are occasions when professional photographers descend upon Zion, as do area residents who know that snow calls for a special trip into the park.

Visitors from afar — who fare relatively few during midwinter — don't necessarily know that deep snow is a rarity.

"A lot of people don't know that Zion 'never' gets snow because they've never been here," Haraden notes. "And they find it's a surprise … it's just unusually beautiful."