Sunday, May 04, 2008

Vacation part 3, in which we do not go canyoneering.





On Thursday morning, we were scheduled to take a canyoneering trip with Zion Rock and Mountain Guides. Unfortunately we forgot/didn't know that there was a time difference between Las Vegas and Zion, so we got there late and nobody was there. We were upset about that, because we didn't figure that there would be any refund (or at least that we'd lose a sizeable deposit).





Since we were already there, we decided to make the best of things and do some hiking. We picked the Angels' Landing trail, which is "not for anyone who is afraid of heights." Oops.




We had to do some serious switchbacks (called Walter's Wiggles). This trail, though steep, wasn't all that strenuous. It was a nice hike until we hit Scouts Landing.


Then, however, came the scary part. OK, it wasn't scary for Tara at all, but it was for me. As my knees grew weak and my head began to spin, I chickened out and went back to Scout's Landing. Soon Tara came back, telling me that it was another 1/2 mile to Angel's Landing. I tried going farther, but it just wasn't going to happen.
Perhaps you can see the sheer cliffs and drop-offs in the next picture. It made me light headed just looking at them.
So we headed back down.

Incidentally, when we got back to the Zion Rock and Mountain Guides store, we found that there had been a communication breakdown; they had told us to be there at 6:30 am, but they didn't expect us until 8. Because it was an honest mistake, they told us they would refund our entire cost or take us at another time. They were completely cool about it.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good grief, where is someone to walk in that picture?!?!? And did you think about crawling or slithering?!?!?
And that's pretty cool that you didn't lose money, but sorry to hear you didn't get to go canyoneering. Next time, I guess...

Brian Vinson said...

Ah, but just you wait... I'm only 1 1/2 days into the vacation!

Big Mama said...

How very exciting!! I got light headed and dizzy just looking at the pictures!