View of Angels Landing, photo by Harold Davis. View this image larger.

This is a view of the spine of Angels Landing with the Zion Canyon floor far below.

I hadn’t realized until I was actually in Zion National Park that I have visited this wonderful place twice before. Once, as a kid with a camera, with my parents and brother on the canonical camping trip ending in California. And again, as a photographer in my twenties.

Nothing inside Zion has changed much in all that time. But outside protected lands, southwestern Utah is changing fast into a country of generic strip malls and McMansion subdivisions.

Anyhow, the strange thing is I didn’t really remember Zion until I came back. With memory returning, I realize, “I photographed that tree before, by golly.”

The land hasn’t changed, the vistas are much the same, but my perspective has altered. I have found my center, and know what I am. I can hike the canyon rims, photograph sunset, and come down by starlight. I can wander up winding canyons filled with water. What was I thinking way back then to be so timid about making my way into the heart of this great land?