Hidden Canyon. 7/1/12

We had permits to do the Subway on Sunday and were going to use the Russel Gulch approach. None of us had done it before, but after talking a little bit we decided to turn the permits back in and go to Hidden Canyon. We had already done the Subway twice this year and even though I don't think we could ever get sick of, someone else was going to have a lucky day when they showed up the morning of and there were 15 walk ins available. Rick also had drawn 3 in the last minute drawning and I had 12. We stopped by the desk which didn't end up being too bad of a line, got our permits and headed up past the tunnel. Instead of the standard East Rim or Zion Ponderosat approach, we started up an alternative approach to the mesa, which was shorter in mileage, but definitely not lacking in climbing effort and bushwacking. None of us had ever done Hidden Canyon before but the head of the canyon is pretty easy to find and we made our way the steep dirty slope to the first rap. We all had a great time descending hidden canyon. The last report says they would never go back, but when we got down, we all concluded that it was well worth a repeat. There is plenty of spicy downclimbing and almost every rap has some sort of awkwardness to it. A couple of raps that go back up into the canyon into caves that the other canyons don't offer. However went before us had placed new webbing on all the anchors and as of now they are in good shape. The last rap didn't have a quick link on it so we placed one. I assume they ran out after placing the new webbing. Definitely don't regret trading our subway passes in. Thanks to all that came with us, hopefully we can get together again. Here as some pics that Rick took, We had 5 cameras and a go pro on the trip and I will put a link to more pics once they get loaded to my photobucket.Attachment 55988Attachment 55987Attachment 55989Attachment 55990Attachment 55991Attachment 55992Attachment 55993Attachment 55994Attachment 55995

Nice TR dude. :2thumbs:

Thanks for the TR

Rob will be disappointed if I leave out his highlight of the trip. As we are hiking up the approach canyon it's fairly early in the morning and we come across 2 girls camping up in there. We'll just leave it as they weren't entirely there for the camping. The while rest of the day all we heard abou is the two girls and how good of video his go pro could take. He did disappear a few times so maybe we do need to get ahold of it before it gets edited:haha:

I would like to add that Hidden Canyon is a delightful half day hike from the valley floor. To our surprise My 64 yr old wife and I hiked further up canyon than any of the much younger hikers on the trail.