Zion: The Narrows

After renting our canyoneering gear the night before, we were all set for a day of hiking the Narrows. Zion Adventure Company has a great deal where you can rent a hiking stick, hardcore water shoes, and little sock booties for $21. When you put the shoes on, you feel as if you are an astronaut, but they are well worth it after a few hours of hiking in the water. Also, they are good about giving you some pointers and letting you know if it’s a good day to do the hike (and no flashflood warnings are present). We also made sure to use dry bags so that we could get our backpacks wet for the inevitable swims that we would encounter.

The Narrows isn’t like any hike we have done before… It is actually walking, wading and swimming through the Virgin River down an amazing 1,000 feet deep canyon that is only about 24 feet wide at some points. I have done this hike once before in October, but I was looking forward to seeing the differences in temperature, water level, and amount of people. It was even more beautiful than I had remembered. Zion was about 100 degrees that day, but in The Narrows it was much cooler which was nice to have a break from the sun. Along the way we were surrounded by hanging gardens, various colored sandstone rock walls, waterfalls, creepy narrow caves, and gorgeous green and blue water. Scotty’s favorite parts of the hike included: Lunchtime when he finally got to eat his PB & J sandwich and Gushers, exploring Orderville Canyon (a side slot canyon, where we had to climb a old log to get up and over a waterfall), and floating down the river on the way back.