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Thread: Pleiades Update

  1. #1

    Pleiades Update

    Steph and I had high hopes of doing a lap through Pleiades today, but the flow is still quite high. Like a fire hydrant? 10 CFS?

    Also, there was a car-sized block of ice just inside the canyon entrance. It looked undercut by the water. Unstable?

    Clearly, the conditions were beyond our skill set. It was a very easy decision to retreat. The hike to and from the canyon was very nice, so it wasn't a total loss (photo included).

    Looking down at the large block of ice.
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    A very nice hike took the sting out of our decision to retreat.

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  4. #2
    Sounds like the right call. I remember doing it and rigging an anchor under a boulder...covered in slow flowing ice cold water. Tough. Not much CFS then, so with ice and a fast run off it would be dangerous.

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  6. #3
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Size:  74.7 KBWe did a group of 4 on memorial day. Lots of ice and quite a bit of water. We did a retrievable anchor the first rap in, but the rest of the anchors in there looked good. Haven't had time to post a TR yet. I was in a 3/2, which wasn't enough . The ice made it really interesting and spectacular. Car to car was just under 3 hrs.

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  8. #4
    Our group was looking to do this canyon within the week and now I'd like to know more about it than I've already read about it.

  9. #5
    Quote Originally Posted by mcweyen View Post
    Our group was looking to do this canyon within the week and now I'd like to know more about it than I've already read about it.
    Got your PM. A few things led to our decision:

    A. The water looked uncomfortably high. Steph and I have no real Class C experience. We have no unique tricks in our bag to overcome rap problems, mid-rappel, with ice water blasting us in the face.

    B. The large ice block we could see spooked me. It was huge and it looked unstable. If I touched it, would it move? Or break? Were there other bergs downcanyon?

    C. I only had a 3/2 wetsuit. It was clearly not enough protection for water that cold (33 degrees?). I had a 7mm in the car, and thought about getting it.

    D. Steph and I can only overcome so much. A larger team can usually handle larger problems.

    E. We had never done that route before. If it was a route I was familiar with, then I could picture the potential problems much more clearly.

    F. It didn't look fun. It looked like freezing wet hell on a biscuit.

    Hope that helps. Good luck if/when you go!

    Bob
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  10. #6
    With more wetsuit+rainjacket and a group like we had in Choprock, would you be interested in going or still no?

  11. #7
    Your group in Choprock was STRONG. Tough guys on your team can overcome many things. It would be a blast to do a canyon with you guys sometime.

    When I stood over the first drop the instinctive part of my brain screamed "NO!!!". I pictured getting beat down with ice water (wetsuit/rain jacket only helps so much), getting stuck in the flow, possibly moving a berg down canyon onto Steph? Maybe my imagination was running wild??

    I'll wait until August/September. The canyon will always be there. Someone with more tolerance/experience should answer your question.
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  12. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by Slot Machine View Post
    I'll wait until August/September. The canyon will always be there. Someone with more tolerance/experience should answer your question.

    Sound decisions should never be questioned my friend. Better to live another day than die being a "hard ass."
    It's only "science" if it supports the narrative.

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  14. #9
    @mcweyen, how was it??

    I'm very curious. (and perpared to be called a wuss )

    Bob
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  15. #10
    My friend who went through with us 5-27-13 (when it was full of ice) went again today 6-18-13 and said the ice is all gone. He went solo and finished in just under an hour.

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  17. #11
    It was a ton of fun! It was one of the most spectacular places I've ever been! We had nine of us go through it. It took us six hours. The two big time consumers were changing into wetsuits and rain gear and then we hiked out what started out like a trail and turned into bush whacking. I'm guessing there is a quality trail back all the way. If we had two effective ropes, it would have gone faster too. We had two, but one was only 55ft long and didn't quite reach for most of the raps. The other was 200ft. Neither were really optimal. It was a bit challenging to keep everyone warm too. With nine people, there is a lot of standing around. Everyone had on at least 6mm and rain gear, but that wasn't enough for some. I had on a 4mm farmer john, a 4mm full, a 2mm top, 5mm socks and some insulated thermal gloves (had 5mm neo and regular Atlas gloves available as well) and was perfectly warm the whole time. With the warmth, I was able to help other people who were a bit chilled.

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  19. #12
    Moderator jman's Avatar
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    Wow, 6 hours huh. That's a LONG time for a 30min canyon. Ha ha.

    Your first time through trying to find the exit trail out can be interesting. But once you find it out, its easy to from there on.
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  20. #13
    I would be willing to bet an extremely large amount of money that nobody can make it car to car in half an hour in the conditions we had. An hour for a single person would be difficult to believe as well, but I might buy it. Nine people with seven raps and putting on a ton of gear takes quite a bit of time. Changing must have taken us at least half an hour if not more. Organizing and making sure everyone had what they needed to have on was a time consumer for sure. A single person could really go a lot faster. I "think" we may have seen the exit route, but people wouldn't buy into it since it looked like it went to the other side of the creek. My bet is that it went back over and then out.

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  22. #14
    It's not about how long it takes.... it's about how much fun you had.

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  24. #15
    Moderator jman's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by mcweyen View Post
    I would be willing to bet an extremely large amount of money that nobody can make it car to car in half an hour in the conditions we had. An hour for a single person would be difficult to believe as well, but I might buy it. Nine people with seven raps and putting on a ton of gear takes quite a bit of time. Changing must have taken us at least half an hour if not more. Organizing and making sure everyone had what they needed to have on was a time consumer for sure. A single person could really go a lot faster. I "think" we may have seen the exit route, but people wouldn't buy into it since it looked like it went to the other side of the creek. My bet is that it went back over and then out.
    I was teasing. And for time reference I was thinking the canyon proper not the entrance and exit hike combined. Tr conditions look like fun though. Even in October when it's a trickle and a wetsuit it still is very cold, especially the 5th rappel in the cavern.

    Yea the exit basically once you cross tr slippery log is to head up the hill following the steadily growing defined trail. There isn't much bushwacking on the exit trail actually. On the entrance trail there is a little bushwhacking but it all depends on if you take the watercourse or follow the more direct hiker trail.
    ●Canyoneering 'Canyon Conditions' @ www.candition.com
    ●Hiking Treks (my younger brother's website): hiking guides @ www.thetrekplanner.com
    "He who walks on the edge...will eventually fall."
    "There are two ways to die in the desert - dehydration and drowning." -overhearing a Park Ranger at Capitol Reef N.P.
    "...the first law of gear-dynamics: gear is like a gas - it will expand to fit the available space." -Wortman, Outside magazine.
    "SEND IT, BRO!!"

  25. #16
    It's not about how long it takes.... it's about how much fun you had.
    Exactly! We had a blast in there! There were a few people pretty well done by the time we were back to the trail in via bushwhacking. Two of our crew had one or less hours of sleep in the last 48hrs. They were toast.

  26. #17
    Quote Originally Posted by mcweyen View Post
    I would be willing to bet an extremely large amount of money that nobody can make it car to car in half an hour in the conditions we had. An hour for a single person would be difficult to believe as well, but I might buy it.
    Car to car in a half an hour would be pretty speedy. Except, maybe, when you consider Pine Creek in Zion has been done pavement to pavement in under 31 minutes...

  27. #18
    FYI, we went through pleiades with a group of 9 venture scouts (16-18 years old) + 3 leaders on Thursday, June 20. No more ice at all. It was possible to stay mostly out of the direct water flow on all but 2 or 3 of the raps. Minimum wetsuit in our group was a 4/3 and that was pretty much OK. If anything, feet seemed to be coldest.

    The coldest part of the canyon for us was after the 3rd rap. That rap takes you down into an enclosed feeling grotto with water splashing all around. The 4th rap station is right in that grotto. We had to wait at that station because we mismanaged our rope leap-frogging forward. By the time we all got out of that chamber we were all a little chilled because it was shaded and there was water bouncing all around so you felt like you were in a cold rain storm. However, once we got going again we warmed back up to a reasonable level. Overall, we were moving through the canyon quite quickly so that kept us much warmer than if we were waiting around at each station.

    We left the parking lot just before 2 PM and instructed one of the adults that wasn't going with us to call for help if he didn't see us by 9 PM. Based on recent reports I figured that would give us plenty of time to make it--unless we had problems. We definitely weren't trying for any kind of speed record but much to our surprise, we made it out by 5 PM. Almost all of the boys on the trip have been canyoneering for 3+ years so they knew how to handle themselves in the canyon and they all moved quickly and efficiently. Please file this away in the "scouts aren't always incompetent" file.

    All anchoring is very obvious and in good shape. I think it was the second drop that is rigged off a tree about 50 feet back from the drop. It is an interesting set-up but it does the job. There is a cairn type anchor with several slings at the last anchor.

    Our only problem at all on the trip was that my drybag leaked and destroyed our printed beta. I had read but not memorized the exit beta so I wasn't pleased when I couldn't read it when we finished the tech section. It took us a couple of minutes to figure out that at the end of the last rap you climb the steep slope on your left rather than heading down canyon and then right. However, even without printed instructions, it was pretty obvious which way to go based on the well used trail heading up the slope.

    Everyone loved the canyon. I would recommend it. I can see how even a few days/weeks at this time of the year makes a HUGE difference in this canyon. Compared to pictures posted just 7-10 days before our trip, the volume of water we encountered was much different (much less for us) and all the ice was gone. This made for a relatively easy passage. I can easily see that higher water flow and/or ice in the canyon could make things much more difficult.

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