Feeling Small in A Big, Big World

So my brother Adam called me a month and a half ago and asked if I wanted to meet him in October at Zions National Park in southern Utah to hike the Narrows. He had to do very little convincing. We had to do more work on my dad, but he finally bent and started training for the 16 mile hike through the Zion Slot Canyon. He passed through the canyon in better shape than Adam and me for sure.

For those of you who have not heard of this hike, it's amazing. We contracted with a shuttle service that took us up to the trail head at 6:30 in the morning. The ride up was very interesting and provided plenty of entertainment for the rest of the trip. The 40+ year old driver had an obvious love for the outdoors and a love to talk about it...constantly. The drive from the Zions Visitors Center to the trail head was about 1 hr 20 minutes long...he must have talked about 1 hr 15 minutes. I had the pleasure of sitting in the bench seat right behind the driver while Adam and my dad sat behind me. They couldn't hear much of what he was saying so I needed to be the polite one and respond to his monologue...much to Adam's amusement I might add. The guy was actually very informed and I learned a lot about everything from ring tailed cats to coned nosed beetles. Apparently the driver's been bit several times...not sure how he's been stung, but when you live in a remote cabin that has ring tailed cat claw marks on your kitchen cabinets and heat your home with a wood fireplace, coned nosed beetles may be living with you.

Anyway, the hike starts in a mountain cattle ranch. For the first 3 miles the trail follows a dirt road that leads toward the slot canyon. The canyon slowly encloses on you to the point that you can almost touch both walls at the same time. About 8 miles into the hike you run into a 20 foot waterfall that has been created by logs, dirt, and rocks that have logged between the two walls.



Fortunately 20 feet to the South of the waterfall there is a narrow passage through the rocks that provides a way down without ropes.

After the first 3 miles, you hike in and out of the water and cross the Virgin River hundreds of times throughout. A tributary, Deep Creek, joins up to the Virgin River about 9 miles into the hike and the rocks become slippery. Dad was the only casualty of the slippery rocks. He claims that the Narrows website states that "even expert hikers slip and fall in the narrows," so he must be an expert. As you can see, we wore special dry suit pants in the river since the water was very cold. They gave me 2XXL size pants. The crotch was around my knees when I wore them appropriately around my waist. I called them my maternity pants.

The narrowest portion of the hike, where the water is wall to wall most of the year, is called wall street. Since it's late Fall, the water was fairly low and only came up to our waists in the deepest spots.

Right before entering wall street, there are two large natural springs, called Big Springs, coming directly out of the wall of the canyon. The springs are adorned with beautiful ferns and apparently flow 365 days a year. It's pretty impressive.

The walls in the deepest and narrowest sections are 1500 feet. Not much sun gets in there and you truly feel very small.If you're not up to doing the full 16 miles, you can start from the bottom up and go up to 5 miles up the canyon, without a permit, and see some of the impressive narrows. This picture of Adam and my dad is less than a half a mile from the end of the hike.

Hudson actually came on the trip (he didn't hike) and Blake came with Adam. They hung out with Grandma while we hiked for 10 hours. Thank you Mom for watching them. Hudson had a great time with you and Blake.

On our way back, with stopped in Las Vegas for lunch with my old roommate Blake and his family. I had a great time catching up with them. Hannah and Blake are great people and obviously very good parents.

This final photo has nothing to do with our hike, but was impressive anyway. From Las Vegas to Phoenix, we crossed the Hoover Dam. They are constructing a new bridge right now to get highway traffic off of the top of the dam. You can see the new bridge at the top left. You can't see it, but there is still a 300 or 400 foot gap in the bridge and is thousands of feet above the bottom of the canyon. Thanks for lunch Hannah and Blake.