Planning to visit Zion National Park with kids? Here’s my best tips for visiting this iconic park!
Zion National Park is located in Zion National Park is located in southwestern Utah, about 40 miles from St. George. You’ll find the main entrance in Springdale, UT.
This national park is well known for it’s s known for its tall sandstone cliffs, canyons, and extensive hikes. It’s the home of The Narrows, an exceedingly popular trail, along with Angels Landing.
Our 4 kids really enjoyed this park. To be completely honest, I was REALLY looking forward to seeing this National Park but it wasn’t at all what I expected. More on that later!
Here’s everything you need to know to plan your visit!
What to Know Before You Go
Zion National Park is really REALLY popular. That means it’s REALLY busy. The main entrance is the only place you can park if you want to walk the popular trails in Zion.
To get a parking spot in the National Park, you need to get there early. Our first day at Zion, we didn’t arrive until 10 am and the parking lot was full, so we had to use the parking meters along the streets in Springdale and then take a bus tram to the National Park entrance.
Once you are actually inside the National Park….there’s more lines. Long lines. Theme-park LONG lines of people waiting to take the bus tram up to the trailheads within the park.
It’s a long way inside the canyons to see the beautiful sights so the buses are necessary.
We found that this long line exists basically all day. When we arrived around 7:30am the following day, we still encountered the long line…and it was there both days when we left as well.
I learned that there’s 2 types of people that go to Zion – the hikers with all their gear, walking stick in hand, hiking boots, and water sipping backpack. And then, there’s my family….with our sneakers, water bottles in hand, no hiking gear…. just a backpack of snacks and extra water.
To say it simply, we were outnumbered and out of place. We quickly learned that these well-prepared hikers had that gear for a good reason. This trails are no joke.
There’s slippery spots, scrambling up large rocks, and all together the trails were nothing like any of the other National Parks I’d been to.
But…no worries, we found some great ways to experience Zion with kids!
What to Bring
Comfortable Walking Shoes – preferably hiking boots – You’ll be walking a lot. Unless you stick to the Riverside Walk, most of the trails have steep inclines and rocks to climb over or onto, so you’ll want those hiking boots with traction.
Walking Stick – as I mentioned, our family didn’t have walking sticks, and we wished we did! They would have been very handy to help us keep our footing on steep inclines and slippery trails. You can rent one outside of the park in Springdale, but Amazon is much more reasonable.
Sunscreen – This is a must for a day in the sun!
Hat – A hat is necessary when you are hiking to keep the sun off your face and head.
Comfortable Backpack – to carry necessities, your lunch, extra water
Lunch – We packed a light lunch of cheese sticks, apples, chips, and crackers.
Water – Bring plenty of water – the climate here is very hot and dry. You’ll feel dehydrated very quickly.
Hand Sanitizing Wipes – Many of the trails only have pit bathrooms (no running water). Wipes are great for “handwashing.”
What to Do at Zion National Park
The Riverside Walk
First, I’d recommend heading for the Riverside Walk.
This is the easiest trail in the park. It’s mostly flat and there’s beautiful river views.
You are basically walking inside of a canyon and it’s really pretty.
My kids loved all of the places that you could detour off the path to enjoy looking at the rushing water.
To get here, you’ll take the Shuttle bus to stop 9 (Temple of Sinawava).
The Riverside Walk is shady and cool in the morning, which is really enjoyable compared to the heat and dehydration of other parts of this park.
This trail is really busy, because it is where the people who are hiking The Narrows begin their journey. As a family with 4 kids, we would often veer off the trail to see the river when we saw large groups of hikers coming up behind us.
You can actually walk all the way into the first section of The Narrows and get that iconic picture, without actually doing the hike.
When my kids get older, I would love to take them into The Narrows all the way! It’s beautiful!
Lower Emerald Pool
Our family also did the Lower Emerald Pool which was marked as Easy on the Zion Information Guide.
On this trail, you walk along a cliff (so hold your child’s hand!) all the way down to the water pool. There’s a little bit of rock scrambling to get down to the pool, but otherwise it’s a pretty clear path.
Please note that the ONLY part of this trail that is easy is to the Lower Emerald Pool.
The trail does continue on and increases in difficulty quite a bit to what is considered the moderate range of difficulty.
Our family didn’t realize this and we pressed on, to do the whole trail which became increasingly difficult and dangerous. There’s lot of rocks to climb up and over, slippery rock surfaces, and the descent at the end had us clinging to the side of a rock so that we didn’t slip and fall on the slippery gravel as we came down the last part of the path.
Honestly, it was not at all a trail I would recommend anyone with kids to do.
However, if your kids hike regularly and wear hiking boots they probably wouldn’t flinch on this trail. My kids are athletic and had hiked in sneakers in all the other National Parks on our vacation, but this one was different.
They would have done so much better with hiking boots. That extra traction is SO needed on these slippery paths.
Kolob Canyons
If you are looking for a more secluded visit to Zion, off the beaten path, away from the crowds, this is for you!
In my opinion, Zion is almost too crowded to enjoy. However, Kolob Canyons redeemed the park for me.
To see Kolob Canyons, you need to enter the park from a different direction.
Just north of La Verkin, you can enter the park by the Kolob Canyons Visitor Center. You can drive on the Kolob Canyons Road and use the various pull off points to stop and take pictures of all of the amazing rock formations.
It’s beautiful, peaceful, and exactly what I was hoping for.
If you like seeing Zion via car, you can also travel through Springdale and into Zion National Park taking the Zion-Mount Carmel Highway. This highway has some great views of Zion but for the driver, it’s not super relaxing as it is full of switchbacks and tunnels. We took this road to go to Bryce Canyon National Park.
I hope this has been helpful in planning your trip to Zion National Park.
More National Parks Tips
If you are interested in visiting more National Parks, you might also like to visit the Great Sand Dunes National Park as well. It’s such a fun place for families with young kids.
You can learn all about Visiting the Grand Canyon with kids here. It’s definitely a bucket-worthy trip!
Plus, you can find all of our best tips for Visiting Mesa Verde National Park with kids here. The history of this place is amazing!
And don’t forget to get the free printable Road Trip Packing List here. It’s perfect for that big family road trip!
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