So when did canyoneering start?

[shaggy125]

I won't claim to know anything as far as detailed history of the sport and Shane's info sounds a lot like what I've heard too. As far as "is Utah the creme of the crop?" probably just depends on who you ask. I'm sure all of us would love to travel the world doing canyons on every continent to determine where the best of the best are but most of us can't do that. There are however many canyons outside of Utah. Canyoneering (called Canyoning outside of America) in Europe is extremely popular from what I've seen. Generally people who do canyons out there do it for the swimming, jumping, and waterpark-like features of so many of the canyons in Europe. In fact in Europe there is even a Canyoning amusement park.

http://www.canyoning-park.com/description.htm

Rich Carlson was talking about Canyoning in Europe and said that a lot of people think we are nuts doing dry canyons, they don't understand how that could be fun. Here are some photos and videos of European style canyoning:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...898553879489&q
http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...763548937474&q
http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...663084896122&q
http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...939428553876&q
http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...436380687670&q
http://www.alpix.com/nice/htmlen/pictclu.htm
http://www.inextremis-aventura.com/f..._catalogne.php
http://www.tic.udc.es/~nino/cerdena/...ddu_fotos.html

The Blue Mountains in Australia are full of Zion-esque sandstone canyons, except they are in a less dry climate meaning most canyons have at least a small flow of water through them, plus vegetation and wildlife abound. I've hung out a little in the Oz Canyons Yahoo Group, and it sounds like most Australia canyons aren't the most technically challenging in the world, but they are some of the most beautiful. Here are some videos and photo's of Australia Canyons:

http://members.ozemail.com.au/~dnoble/canyoning.html
http://ozultimate.com/canyoning/
http://imageevent.com/bluecanyons (lots of videos on here if you look hard enough)

Even in the U.S. Canyoneering is starting to become popular outside of Utah. There are some really good routes showing up in Oregon, Washington, British Columbia, Colorado, and California that are more similar to European style canyoneering. Here are some photos and videos of them:

http://www.canyoneeringnorthwest.hopto.org/
http://imageevent.com/bluecanyons/american
http://imageevent.com/bluecanyons/canada
http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...360867024883&q

Another place with some really good canyons is Monterrey Mexico where last years ACA international rendezvous was held.

http://canyoneeringusa.com/rave/0505mexico/index.htm

I don't know that there are many other places where you find keeper potholes (since most canyons outside Utah have flowing water). Not sure that many Canyoneers outside of Utah have done high off the deck stemming, or crossed over a silo or bomb-bay. These seem to be challenges that are unique to dry canyons like Utah has. Some people I've talked to that have done countless canyons outside of Utah say that tales from Americans about high stemming and bomb bays scares the crap out of them, where stories of high water flows, hydraulics, eddy's etc... would probably scare the crap out of us. Is Utah the creme of the crop? Maybe for dry challenging canyons, but there are so many canyons out there yet to be discovered I wouldn't limit yourself to just Utah, I know I plan on at least making it up to the pacific northwest in the next year or two. Hopefully someday trips to Australia and Europe will be possible.

Eric.

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