These parks are not what them seem like online.
By Emily Warren
I woke up from my tent at about 4 am because I wanted to get the day started early. I arrived at the Zion visitor center around 5 am running into a few other early birds with the same plan of attempting to beat the crowds. The first shuttle did not leave the visitor center until 6:30 am so naturally, I fell asleep in the parking lot. An hour later, I was woken by so much commotion. I hear car doors slamming as they get out of their cars, cars beeping from being locked up and people shuffling towards the shuttle. I open my eyes, and see the sun starting to peak out. I open my eyes wider to complete shock.
In this enormous parking lot, there were no more spots available. I instantly jumped out of the car and headed to the restroom to see how long the wait for the first shuttle was. I was astounded by the number of people already in line for a shuttle as I got closer to the visitor center bathrooms. I began to feel anxious. The line continued to get longer and longer. Shit, I thought. I started to panic.
I dashed back to the car and urgently awoke my traveling buddy. We frantically packed our backpacks, stuffed our peanut butter and Nutella sandwiches inside, and rushed to the line. The line had grown three times its original size in the time since I was last there. By this time, there were hundreds of people in line. After urgently searching for the end of the line, we met up with a park ranger and he told us that it would take two hours to even get on a shuttle to get into the park by the point we were in line. My jaw dropped and I immediately thought, “I should have never fallen back asleep”.
We patiently waited in line for two hours before boarding the shuttle. We were then suddenly crammed into the small cars like sardines, and we were suddenly off down the canyon. Peeking through the tops of other riders' heads through the shuttles window, the ride through the canyon was absolutely breathtaking and majestic. The rock formations are larger than life and make you feel so small in comparison to them yet they are very welcoming. It was still early morning so the sun was shining on them directly making them shimmer with gold and silver. It was unlike anything I had ever experienced and I suddenly felt at peace even having to look through a crowd to see it.
Our driver stated that we had arrived as we began to pull up to the Angels Landing trailhead. I took a glance around me and noticed the massive line she was warning us about; it circled the trailhead. My friend and I jump off the shuttle and rush to the back of the line yet again. A park ranger approached us a few minutes later and warned us that this line would most likely take 4 hours to wait in until we were even able to BEGIN the hike, which was going to take 3-6 hours to even hike the trail.
The ranger explained that because the park was already so crowded, they needed to stagger the amount of people who hike at once to try and preserve the trail. My friend and I agreed to stay and wait for 4 dreaded hours. This hike was one of the top things on my bucket list, I could not come all the way out to Utah to just bail now.
The reason for the large lines? A big reason is the social mediazation of national parks.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
In the midst of finishing up my Junior year in college, I was growing miserable being trapped in my apartment due to Covid placing all of my coursework online. I felt confined, and my daily habit of sitting in front of a laptop for hours on end was both intellectually and physically exhausting. I had the urge to leave Fredericksburg and travel somewhere else less familiar.
At the time, I spent an embarrassingly large chunk of my time on social media sites like Tik Tok and Instagram. The more time I spent on those apps the more I was fantasized with U.S. National Parks fan accounts. The photos and videos highlighted the beauties and wonders of the various parks. Nothing seemed more important to me than experiencing the peacefulness and distinct beauty of these environments. After hours of scrolling, watching and liking, I finally decided to fly to Arizona and travel around the southwest, exploring and touring the National Parks in Utah and Colorado because I was so appealed to the unique hikes these parks had to offer.
The main challenge I experienced was the enormous crowds these National Parks brought. I was aware that the parks I intended to visit were extremely popular, but based on what I saw on social media, it appeared like the influencers I saw were enjoying the beauty of these parks without being too disturbed.
Social media is frequently focused on what viewers want to see, the parks' appearance, rather than what you encounter while visiting them. Many people, like me, are drawn to visit these areas because of the social media presence. Numerous people find that social media is such an important element of documenting their travels that their perception of nature has evolved dramatically as a result of social media. On a podcast from Adriene Hill and Maria Hollenhorst about how How social media hurts and helps the great outdoors, Casey Schreiner says.
“Too much love can be a bad thing. And another thing with Instagram and social media is the information that you’re getting is not always the best. So we’re getting new people into the park, which is great, but a lot of times those new people aren’t necessarily educated on “leave no trace“ ethics, or how you act in the wilderness, why you shouldn’t walk on this certain type of soil, or why you shouldn’t take a rock, or why you shouldn’t leave some graffiti on the trail you’ve left.”
I visited Zion National Park a few days into my road trip. Zion is famous for a hike that has resulted in the deaths of 14 people. This hike's chain segment is the deadliest in the park and also one of the most popularly documented hikes on social media: Angels Landing in Zion National Park. Many people hype up how unique this hike is due to how dangerous this hike is. Often times people use the danger to draw people to the hike on social media through tik toks and Instagram posts.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
At about 12, the mid afternoon, the sun was beating hard on our faces. We finally approached the front of the 4 hour line that we had been waiting in, and the park ranger gave us the okay to start heading up the trail. This was definitely not the ideal time to be starting one of the most dangerous hikes in America.
The sun became hotter, the line became longer, and we became exhausted as the hours passed. We'd advance a slight step forward in line every 20 minutes, but it seemed like we'd never get to this hike.
We arrived at the trailhead and started to climb up the mountain. The hike was already overcrowded, even though the ranger was staggering people up the trail. We were constantly passing groups and groups of people for the first mile and a half. We were continuously on someone's heels, and whenever we stopped for a break, we were surrounded by at least 5 other hikers.
After the second set of steep switchbacks, we were practically gasping for air, but we had to quickly prepare ourselves for the hike's hardest and scariest stretch: the chain section.
This section of the hike is on extremely narrow rocks, only a few feet wide, with over 1,000 feet of vertical drop on either side. Only by grabbing onto chains embedded through the rock can you keep yourself safe up there.
The hike always seemed scary but manageable whenever I saw this section on social media because you only had to worry about yourself and the chains. That was not the circumstance when we arrived at this section. There were so many people trying to hike this part at the same time that the only way to keep safe was to move forward in a group in one direction. If hikers approached you on their way back from the Angels Landing summit and wanted to get around you, you had to pause and allow them to grab the chains and squeeze around you in an already tight place. We had to worry about ourselves as well as other hikers getting around you, things became considerably more stressful.
While hiking, I continued to take photos and videos for my Instagram account even though that caused me to possibly risk my life. I wanted people to know how incredible Zion was, and I also wanted to brag about my achievements to my friends. I must admit, though, that I was always attempting to capture photos without other people just like how I saw them on social media. I'm not sure if that was because I'm a photographer or because I'm trying to capture the beauty without other people getting in the way of it or for the total purpose of social media.
Despite the crowds that I ultimately encountered, visiting Zion National Park for the first time was one of the most memorable experiences of my life. I will credit social media for showing me the beauty and wonder of these incredible places, and I was able to enjoy them with just a little more wait time than I had originally anticipated. I wasn't able to get as much done in one day as I had hoped, but that did not even bother me.
Casey Schreiner, in the podcast titled, How Social Media Hurts and Helps the Great Outdoors, states: “The phrase that you hear most often is that these parks and trails and public lands are being “loved to death.” Basically they are the modern form of sort of publication and awareness, but a lot of times these parks are not equipped to deal with that onslaught of people that come…I think at the end of the day it’s a net positive, because you’re getting people into these special landscapes and they’re experiencing them in many cases for the first time. So if you can get people out to these public lands, and they can see what makes them special and what makes them magical, then you have the chance of turning even a small portion of those people into outdoor stewards.”