ZION NATIONAL PARK — It is a place of spectacular, towering cliffs, shimmering Navajo sandstone formations and the roar and rush of the Virgin River, which painstakingly carves a masterpiece of geologic formations duplicated nowhere else in the world.

As the park gears up this summer to mark the official centennial of its designation first as a national monument back in 1909, it also prepares to do what it does best — play host to the nearly 3 million visitors who come each year to experience its wonders.

And come they do.

They walk as fathers with babies strapped to their chests and backs or as old men with canes determined not to let the confines of age trap their appreciation for nature.

They come in wheelchairs, in strollers, or walk briskly with hiker's walking sticks, or they walk with prosthetic limbs.

Older visitors play chess at the historic Zion Lodge or lick ice-cream cones in the shade while young families picnic on the expanse of the hotel's front lawn.

Muscled-up mountaineers dangling climbing ropes and carabineers have descended from their rocky conquests, swilling bottled water, wiping sweat and talking about their next big adventure.

Zion is admittedly a place for all ages, all outdoor experience levels and all people from everywhere, because nearly everyone will tell you Zion is more than just a place, more than Utah's first national park and more than a destination vacation spot.

More than anything, Zion is an experience, a state of being.

"What I see and feel myself is that people who come here, even if they are not religious, there is something spiritual about the grandeur of the park," said park superintendent Jock Whitworth.

The park's names certainly support that idea.

Zion is Hebrew for sanctuary or refuge, and Kolob — the name given to the water-carved canyons on the north side of the park — is a term for the residence closest to God.

Other geologic landmarks take on spiritual names: the Great White Throne where God is believed to reside; Angels Landing, the park's most famously intimidating hike; the Court of the Patriarch, with peaks Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; and the Temple of Sinawava.

But those who know the park best or even first-time visitors say the spiritual essence of Zion goes well beyond the man-given monikers.

"Zion has that spiritual thing about it. I don't care what religion you are, all you have to do is take a look around you at those cliffs, those formations, the scenery, and you realize life isn't that bad," said Dean Cook, president of the Zion Canyon Visitors Bureau.