Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Englestead

On July 26 a few friends and I hiked Englestead Canyon, dropped into Orderville Canyon, and finally dropped in the Narrows in Zion's National park.

Englestead was fun because of a giant 300-foot (91 meter) drop at the very beginning. You don't quite realize how high 300 feet is until you're hanging over the edge, and it takes well over four seconds for a falling rock (or body) to hit the ground...

Below is a picture at the head of the canyon. It's amazing how abruptly it starts, going from a slight slope to a sudden, 300-foot drop.


Below is us gearing up for the drop. Putting on harnesses, unpacking ropes, packing up everything else. We had a 300-foot rope for the rappelling side, and a 100- and 200-foot rope for the pull cord.


Here's our first person going down. The descent took probably 3 or 4 minutes, depending on how quickly you went.


Looking down the Big Wall from the top. I'm not even sure if you can see the bottom in this picture.


Once in the canyon, we were met by BOUSs (Bugs Of Unusual Size).


We had quite a few more rappels as well, but none close to the first rappel.


Once we dropped into Orderville canyon, water started appearing and things started getting a little greener.



Watch your head.



In the lower part of Orderville, we ran into a lot of tourists that hiked up the Narrows, and once we reached the Narrows themselves it was postively crowded.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

wow, that looks quite fun. funny that tourists were there too.

The Writer said...

Yeah, as soon as Englestead Canyon drops into Orderville Canyon there's no more rappels all the way to the Narrows, so tourists can walk up-canyon. Orderville Canyon is a pretty popular trip.

Anonymous said...

As for the BOUS, i dont believe the exist.

ahh!!

prin said...

That looks crazy awesome (and scary).