A few weeks ago we got together with Maren, Brita and her boyfriend, Matt, and hiked the narrows from the top! It was a trip that Morgan has had in the works for awhile, so to see it come to fruition was a happy day. In fact the day after our 2 days of hiking we all thought, "Well that went fast." However, while hiking all 17 miles in a river that ranged from ankle deep to chest deep there was more than a few times that we thought (maybe not Morgan who is just as studly as they come) this hike may never end!!! Don't get me wrong, the hike was BEAUTIFUL, and totally worth it, but I underestimated that hike in a very large way. Luckily my husband is Mr. Prepared when it comes to trips like these, so we had our hiking poles all ready and quickly realized after 7 1/2 hours in sometimes fast moving thigh deep water that those poles were more than a luxury, almost a necessity! They saved my life more than a few times!!! (Therefore my recommendation being if you are hiking the narrows and the flow rate is at least 90 or higher, BRING POLES. Or else wait later in the year when the water's flow rate is lower). All complaining aside (not that I'm meaning to complain, just my forewarning to all those I love who may consider hiking the narrows really), the hike was one of the coolest hikes I've ever done. The scenery was gorgeous at all times, and even camping in the narrows was an awesome experience! Our campsite, which we didn't get the best picture of, was like this little island almost, hugging a thousand foot high cliff with opposing cliffs just as high. The moon was full, and not that we ever really saw it through the tall narrow cliffs, but it lit up the upper half of the wall across the river. It was breathtaking, seriously. And Morgan's backpack was broken into by a squirrel, which he swears was a rat. But no one saw it, we just found the holes in his trail mix. It was an awesome adventure, one that I may do again, but not for a very, very, very long time (it hurt!!!). Get ready for lots of pics
Just starting out, the river is nice, calm and even fairly warm
Seattle girls hugging the beautiful, but slightly scorched, tree :). Maren loves the tree the most.
Brita and Matt. The first part of the hike (first half of the first day) looked like this most of the time.
We hike in water.
Love him
Maren took a lot of pictures, which I have not been granted access to, but I did get a picture of her in her photo-happy state. She's cute :)
We always seem to get a picture of Morgan laying one on me every time we go out into nature. I think its because he's just so happy to be outside :) So this one is for "traditions" sake
coming into the first real narrows, except for this was a very short section. The walls were so tall that it seemed so dark hiking through these sections
There was this wall with water running down (not enough to call a waterfall, and that's more than a trickle...) Anyways, it looked like someone had taken a giant paintbrush and made a solid stroke. It was cool
This is the waterfall we almost thought we'd have to jump off of, until we noticed the much safer trail hidden on the other side of a giant wall. I thought one of us was going to die. This is the pic Matt got hiking up onto a huge rock trying to reach around, but it was a big mean waterfall!!! (well bigger than I care to jump off of, about 12 feet)
Matt getting the shot. You can see the much safer trail we took to the right.
Ready for a picture, then I looked down and was like, "why are we holding hands???"
"Oh well"
hiking through tall canyon walls (believe it or not this isn't even what they call "the narrows" section of the hike)
This is my favorite picture. This is Morgan trying to get us pumped for day 2 when we're all sore and freezing. The night before we had barely made it to campsite 3 before dark, we were all tired and grumpy because we thought we were suppose to have arrived at campsite 4 about 2 hours earlier!!!! The time estimates given us by the back country desk were INACCURATE. Day 1 was suppose to be a walk in the park compared to day 2, so we were less than enthused waking up that morning still feeling the pains of day 1. Not to mention right before we found our campsite another tributary joined the Virgin river (the Virgin is the river that goes through the narrows), that about doubled the water flow, and brought the water temperature down significantly. It was a good campsite though! We slept under the stars and gorged ourselves on freeze dried meals that tasted like 5 star restaurant food!
Day 2. More water. More beautiful.
Tough guys at Big Springs
Maren "the chipmunk" steals more than just food, keep your CAMELBAK straws tucked away!!
Big Springs was one of the prettiest parts of the hike. It's exactly like it sounds, a really big spring coming out of the wall that's pure enough to drink, and it looks like a tropical paradise in just that one spot because of all the greenery. It was so pretty that Maren and Brita couldn't help themselves from going for a swim, and then froze their bottoms off hiking through the narrows where the sun no longer shines!
Coming out of the first chest high part of the hike. Not my favorite. At about this point we put our camera in a dry bag and never took it out again, so the amount of pictures we took dramatically decreased, but the rest of the hike was narrow, cold, sometimes chest high, sometimes thigh high rapids you're afraid will sweep you off your feet, and when we saw that man made wall at the end of the hike that means you've reached the end, Hallelujah's could be heard all around.
We were going to stay another 2 days in Zion, Morgan wanted to get a permit to do another overnight hike originally, but as we were all in major pain (I was walking like a saddle sore, 90-year old grandma), we decided to head home a day early, and do a scenic drive in which we stopped by Bryce Canyon, and Boulder (Utah). It was a very enjoyable weekend, that we were happy to have a day to recover from before work on Monday.
Morgan had never been to Bryce, so we stopped by real quickly, basically got out of the car took a few pictures of Morgan doing his, "Is this what you want?!?!" pose, and then took off. The only regret I have is that we didn't get a picture of Maren eating the brownies that got soggy in the cooler. They were so gross we actually took them away from her, and she was mad. It's what real friends do, Maren. Those were nasty.
The beautiful drive from Bryce Canyon to Escalante. These are for you Mom, we'll go when you come!!!
This is Hell's Backbone (where the grill got it's name from). They call it Hell's Backbone because the road follows the backbone of this mountain and basically falls off on both sides of the road. It was amazing!!! Utah is Beautiful!!! We couldn't believe how gorgeous this drive was, especially once we got to Boulder and the mountains north of it. The deer and free ranging cows were so abundant that we had to keep 4 eyes on the road to make sure we saw everything. Long drive, but I would definitely do it again, just to go back to Boulder and eat at the Grill. Sorry for the SO LONG post, but it was a trip worth remembering. Great idea Morgan :)
