Yankee Doodle

On Tuesday evening (July 15) straight after work, Robert took us out hiking/canyoneering/rappelling. You know that I love to do that stuff, but I was really worried this particular day because our summer monsoon rains were in full swing (at least, at St. George levels.) Before this past week it’s been hot and clear all month – in the 100-109F range. Then this week it started cooling down (into the upper 90’s) and rained each day. This made Robert want to go up to the canyons and see how they were with water in them. I was worried about flash-flooding – I have at least two cousins that I know of who were killed in flashfloods, along with their Boy Scout troops, in the canyons in Zion. Anyway, we didn’t want to "just say no” so we agreed to go at least as far as the edge of the canyon and then see if it was raining or not. There were six of us: Robert and Kelton, Les and Me, Seth, and Kyle. (Kyle’s dad had given him a lecture about flashflooding in slot canyons.) So we drove up to Leeds, then through Silver Reef, and up past the turn off to Oak Grove, to a nifty little slot that Robert had been shown by his brother Larry. The boys called it "Yankee Doodle" but I don't know if that's really its name or not. Anyway, when we got there the skies were largely clear – it was cloudy to the south – but it was certainly not raining at the moment. So we put on our harnesses, grabbed a couple of ropes, and hit the trail. The first rappel was dry, then we had a bit of bouldering, and then we hit the water. We had a couple of rappels into waist deep pools, but after unhooking from the rope we had to swim across a pool of water that was over our heads. The water was actually pretty warm, I guess because it was still pretty fresh (Robert had taken Kate through the same canyon a week before and it had been bone-dry.) I’ve got to say that I found that my bouldering was much smoother than in the past – I can tell that my upper body strength has increased considerably since I started lifting weights three mornings a week back in May. The climb back up out of the canyon was a bit spooky – we scaled this cliff, breaking out the ropes only twice. All told it was a 70-minute climb down through the slot canyon and then a 40-minute climb back out. Of course, there was an hour-long drive in and out, so we got home after 9:00 that night. But we did get home all safe and sound; the rain stayed away and in fact the temperatures were perfect – warm enough to enjoy the water but cool enough to enjoy the hike. I’d rate the hike somewhere around the level of Keyhole.