Zion National Park sits in southern Utah, between Bryce to the northeast and the North Rim of the Grand Canyon to the south. Summer in the canyon can be hot — low one hundreds — and the park service runs a free bus most of the year. That is useful. The best parts of Zion are still on the trails. Bring shoes you trust.
Fall is the time I like best. You do not have the crowds of summer, the days are mild, and the nights run cool to cold. Autumn usually starts the last week of October into the first week of November, depending on the year. If the conditions are right the color can be fantastic. In summer the temperature can reach 105 to 108°F, which is a different kind of photograph.
I go for the canyon walls and the cottonwoods along the river, and for the years the maples turn. Mid-day in summer is hard on color film. That is when I have used infrared — a 25 red filter, focus shifted — because the heat and the hard sky are what that film wants. The Narrows is a different walk: you are in the river, and the walls close in. That story is in the journal. The fall trips are there too.
The prints below are this canyon, both seasons. The full set is on the Zion collection.