The Grandfather of All Slot Canyons

Zion Narrows is a slot canyon in Zion National Park, and one of the premiere slot canyons in North America. Over the course of millions of years, the Virgin River has carved a deep canyon in the surrounding terrain.  In one of the Narrowest portions, called Wall Street, the canyon walls are less than 25 feet apart and rise well over a thousand feet. Hiking the Narrows means hiking in the Virgin River.  In order to do that, the water flow needs to be under 150 cfs (cubic feet per second).  The last time we were here, it was flowing too fast and the water was too high.  This time, the cfs was 109, well within the range for hiking.  There are several ways to hike The Narrows- hiking “Top Down” , or Thru Hiking involve a commitment of 16 miles.  If you hike “Bottom Up” you can hike as far as you want and turn around.  That’s the one we chose to do.
  The day we arrived here we headed to Zion Adventures, where we got information about renting Dry Suits, poles and special boots. Armed with the information about the river (water temperature being 40 degrees) we elected to reserve the necessary equipment for the next day.  The weather forecast was for a high of 88 and we figured that would be the best day to walk through a cold river.

the ultimate test of a zip loc bag

  I wish I could say we got up early the next day and hit the road, but we didn’t, so our day was shorter than we would have liked it to be.  Everything took a little longer than we expected.  We had to repack our backpack, leaving only what we needed, and double bagging everything we brought.  Swimming and/or falling in the water was a distinct possibility.

Once we got to the outfitter, we found neoprene socks and boots that fit, which took a while.  Once we were ready, we wore the boots, but carried the dry suits so we wouldn’t swelter on the way to the trail.  After taking the Zion shuttle to our stop, we used the benches to put our dry suits half way on, leaving the top half wrapped around our waists for the hot, 1 mile walk to the river.

The outfitters had told us to wear multiple layers of fleece- and we really wish we hadn’t listened.  Between the dry suit and fleece, we were hot most of the day.

Anyway, once we were in the water, the adventure began.  In the first mile or so we would see people venturing up the river in shorts and water shoes, which was relatively easy since the first few river crossings were shallow.

As we got deeper into the canyon, and the walls got more narrow, the river got deeper and faster.  We crossed the river dozens of times and once we were deep into the canyon, we had to walk in the water for longer stretches, until there was someplace to get out. 

I did have some struggles.  I was nervous about falling on my wrist, since the brace wouldn’t fit under the suit, so I was trying to be extremely careful with my footing while in the water. Even knee deep water, when its rushing, can be challenging and exhausting to walk in.  Our sticks were invaluable.
 



Paul gave me pointers such as facing into the water flow so I could maintain my balance easier.  Easy was a relative term though.  On one of the crossings, I came to a clichéd frozen panicked moment when I didn’t think I was going to make it across.  It took about 2 seconds to realize that I was about half way (of course) and one more second to realize that I was using valuable energy just standing there trying to stay upright.  It’s not like I could relax, with the water flowing past me trying to knock me over. From that point on, I did better by trying to keep a reasonable pace. It was certainly a better workout than any Thigh Master on the market!

After a couple of miles, the walls started closing in, and the canyon was gorgeous.  The water was a pretty blue/green and because it was deeper, it was actually easier to walk in. 



turn-around point



Nearing the end of the Wall Street section, we chatted with  fellow hikers who informed us that the next section required actual swimming.  Since it was so close to the end, we elected to pass on the swim, and turn around.



some guy deliberately floating down the river in his dry suit



I started out the day with the camera bagged inside Glad ware and in the back pack, but every time I wanted to take a picture, I had to have Paul wait for me (makes it tough to get good shots of him), take the camera out, shoot, wrap it up and give it back to him.  About half way through, I kept the the Glad ware package inside my dry suit, which had just as good a chance of staying dry as in the backpack.  It survived the day, and neither one of us actually fell in the water, which was nice.

We were extremely tired by the time we got out.