Jeff decided that what we really needed to do this trip was go canyoneering. In October. In water. I don't like to be cold and I REALLY don't like to be cold and wet. This seemed destined to end in disaster.
Neither Jeff or I have much experience with technical canyoneering so he decided to hire a guide to a) make our trip safer and b) teach us so we can start looking in to less technical route on our own in the future.
The guide, Joe, shows up early in the morning and starts talking about how cold and miserable canyoneering is in October and how only tourists are silly enough to want to do such an unpleasant thing. He sounded like he was 3/4 serious and offered us a dry alternative. I was thinking it sounded like a decent idea but Jeff wanted cold, wet and miserable so onward we went.
On the approach hike to the canyon Joe pulled a thin sheet of ice out of the water that was about 2' square to show us. He said something about not kidding about the miserable part. I was pretty nervous.
So, we hike the 2.5-ish miles up to the entrance of the canyon and start pulling on wet suits. The first rappel goes right in to a large pool of water. The water is murky and cold. The walls of the pool are steep and slippery. Its hard to tell how deep the pool is but Jeff and I get knee deep and its cold! Joe unfortunately lost his balance when pulling down the rope and slipped in. He was a tall guy and went in to his shoulders, burr!
The next pool there is no avoiding and we get waist deep. By this point I'm really cold and bouncing from foot to foot to keep moving to stay warm. We go through a series of twists and turns some dry some wet, some we can maneuver around the water some we get wetter, some we rappel, some we was scamper down. At some point I realize that I'm chilly but not really miserable cold and that despite the cold water I'm having fun.
After half a dozen rappels, we see a bend in the canyon flooded in sun. One last rappel to get there and... Yay! Sun! It felt so good and warm. We had a short lunch break and before we were done the sun have moved enough that we were again in the shadow of the canyon walls and we lost the warmth.
More rappels and hiking after lunch took us back to the trail. It felt so nice to strip off the wet suit and put on dry socks, even if they went in my wet shoes. The hike out was warm and pleasant. So, to sum things up, the day was fun, cold, but not miserably so. I like canyoneering, but I'd like it a whole lot more in July!
As we were leaving we saw some people in very conservative clothes. Very odd. I got some strange looks in my shorts. Apparently the town nearest the trail head is a polygamous community. I repeat, very odd.
We ended our day with hot showers. We found some good pizza and drank a glass of (oddly appropriate) polygamy porter.
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| A tight squeeze through the canyon. |
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| Jeff rappelling. |
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| A stone arch. |
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| Me all geared up. |
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| Jeff stemming to try and stay drier. The center was way deeper. |
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| If you look close you can see the the top of the rappel. |
Wow, I've never heard of canyoneering. It sounds like it's rappelling down canyon walls into water?? Do I understand that right? The pictures are great. I'm so glad you didn't end up hating the cold. October is a risky time to play in the water! :)
ReplyDeletePS- LOL at polygamy porter :)