When I did some research on places to visit while my upcoming trip to the South West, I stumbled around this place…

Snow Canyon State Park… Is it cold? Does it look snowy?

Short answer: No! It´s not cold and it doesn´t look snowy at all 🙂 And yet, it is so worth visiting! It´s a perfect stop when ou are heading from Las Vegas to Zion Nationalpark. It´s only a short detour of 30 minutes… For this 30 minutes detour you will get a beautiful state park, that is far away from being crowded! It´s a beautiful & quiet park. The campground is wonderful – so why not stay a night instead of staying in the troubled city of Vegas before jumping into the nature of the closeby nationalparks?

I would say, one day would be perfect to experience the beauty of Snow Canyon State Park. The park fee is 6 $ per vehicle, camping is another 20 $ per site. It´s a beautiful possibility for some stargazing!

Jenny´s Canyon

My favorite part of Snow Canyon State Park was “Jenny´s Canyon”. It´s a beautiful, short, yet really high slot canyon… The colours are changing drasticly depending on the time of your visit. I visited Jenny´s Canyon before sunrise – and it was just amazing how quiet and peaceful it was. It was a little spooky because I was all alone in the canyon & only some birds were gliding through the canyon walls. It was a wonderful & peaceful moment to enjoy and to have all to myself!

Sand Dunes

Another part that I really loved at Snow Canyon State Park was the “Sand Dunes”.

They are very close by Jenny´s Canyon and easily accessible. I went to explore the Sand Dunes right after Jenny´s Canyon, while the sun was slowly coming out and stretching over the Sand Dunes and the red mountains in the background.

It was just wonderful to see how the colours changed immediately. From the warm brown tones to the light shining red colour – and even to a dark orange tone when hitting the sand. AMAZING! And also very pretty: Due to the fact that I visited in May, the spring flowers were still blooming. It was just such a beautiful & an unreal contrast with the desert landscape & the lightly blooming flowers.

So… After you are done exploring Snow Canyon State Park, it is onl a one hour drive to the Entrance of Zion Nationalpark! So if you stay the night at Snow Canyon State Park, visit the most beautiful parts with the sunrise in the morning… You are still one of the first people to head into Zion Nationalpark & beat the crowds at the entrance gates! Isn´t that cool?

To sum up: Don´t miss out on this beautiful landscape, a “little taste of Zion” in my opinion, only without the crowds & without the Narrows and Angel´s Landing for sure!

I won´t say that you should go instead of Zion, but to add it to your list, if you have a spare night and would like to take it a little slower for one day 🙂