Water Canyon, Pine Creek, and Boltergeist (Memorial Day Weekend 5/24-26)
Soooooo...
- warning - no pics. (yet). Waiting for my bodies to upload them, and then will share.
- 5 of us ended up doing Water canyon on Friday. The road to the trail-head was very muddy in the morning, and we barely made it to the parking spot with our rental Ford Expedition (no 4WD). By the time we were back in the car, the mud dried out a bit and it was easier to drive. As for the canyon...We ended up doing the short version, where you rappel off of a tree near the path's U-turn. The canyon was FULL of cold water, and was so much fun. The long rappel (~105'?) at the end was in fairly strong flowing waterfall, and was the highlight of the canyon. All of us (,but one) wore wet-suits (ranges from 4/3 to 5mm) and were fine. One of the guys forgot the wetsuit, so he ended up doing the canyon w/o one...By the end, he was very cold, and had to skip the long rappel. We brought extra clothes for him, which he wore in between deep water sections. He rented one in Springdale for the next days.
- We did Pine Creek on Saturday. As expected, it was full of water. We were walking in knee-waist deep as soon as we dropped into the canyon. the corridor was one long swim, and the guys were pretty cold at the end. The were so happy when we got to the boulder section and get some sun.
- We did Boltergeist on Sun (5/26). What a pleasant surprise...I have done Yankee Doodle multiple times in the past, and always skipped/postponed Boltergeist...what a mistake. IMO, Boltergeist is so much more exciting and rewarding than Yankee Doodle (long free hanging rappel, natural anchors, flowing creek with cascades, etc.). We started ~9am, and three of the guys were traumatized from the previous two canyons, so ended up doing the canyon with wetsuits, despite my advice against it :facepalm1:. One of them was smart enough to get rid of it after the 2nd rappel, but the other two stayed with them until we reach the creek at the bottom...they were semi-dehydrated :roflol:. Did I mention that the canyon had no mandatory wading? Anywho...we had good time in this exposed canyon, and was really nice to end it with a flowing creek and multiple cascades.
