Zion Narrows

16 miles of River Walking
It took us a total of 11 hours to hike it


The Narrows Story:

We left from the ranch (Pangutich Lake Area) at 5:20 AM thinking we would be able to drop off the cars, pick my aunt Lolly, and start the hike by 7:00 am. Nope. Zion is actually 1 ½ hours away from the ranch. We didn’t get to the park until almost 7:00. About 10 minutes out of the park we saw a sign that explained the road inside of Zion was closed from 8:00 PM to 8:00 AM and to expect delays through the construction site during the day. (We actually had to wait at stop lights for no one.) So the drive to drop off a car at the bottom of the Narrows and to drive back to the top of the narrators took 1 ½ hours. We started hiking at 8:30 am. Not too bad – just 1 ½ hours later than what we planned. We had to hike on a dirt road for 3 miles to enter the virgin river and start the Narrows – it actually went by really fast and was very beautiful

Our Hiking Party consisted of 8 people: Nate and I, Nate’s sisters Angela and Celeste, My Aunt Lolly – who is so awesome for coming, Nate’s 15 year old nephew Mike, and our friends Bryce and Amy.

Here we are at the start of the Hike in the Water

The next 5 miles of the hike was the best. The Narrow canyon was beautiful and it was really fun to hike in the water. I managed to stay mostly dry during this part of the hike.

Pictures of the first 5 miles, walking in the water.

A few miles after we stopped for lunch the Narrows turned and a clear running river flowed into the muddy Virgin River (We should have taken a picture of this but the camera was not easy to get to – we had to keep it in a plastic bag inside the backpack.)

After that the Virgin River became deeper and more difficult to walk in.

Pictures of the Next 4 - 5 miles

By this time Mike had blisters on his feet and our legs were becoming a little tired.

When we reached the “falls” (this is the farthest you can hike up the narrows from the River Side Walk in Zion) we had approximately 3 miles left. (It took us 8 hours to walk 13 miles) We were all thinking that 3 miles would be nothing. As you might be able to notice in the picture below – I was able to stay dry from my waist up. But these falls added more water to the Virgin.

After the falls the clouds started to accumulate. Then thunder – the loudest thunder I have ever heard. It echoed off the canyon walls for what seemed to be several minutes. Then rain. Luckily the rain was just enough to cool us off – no flash flood.

The last 3 miles were very slow going. The rocks got bigger, rounder and harder to move around. Before the hiking sticks were helpful by now I think it would be impossible to continue without them. The river is muddy so you can’t see the rocks. Even with the walking sticks our feet would be miss guided, causing us to slip quite often. The rocks became mossy (my shoes turned green) making them even more slippery. By this time of the hike the water was very deep. There were parts that it came up to my chin. At one part the river was divided by a huge rock. One side not so deep but required us to climb over some slippery rocks. Angela, Mike and Amy decided to just swim about 15 feet to shallower water (that was the only part that required someone to swim) we got down to the last mile and realized that our pace had slowed way down. We were moving barley a mile an hour - Which wouldn’t be such a big deal if the road construction did not close the road at 8:00 PM. If we didn’t make it back in time to get through the park to get our car at the top of the Narrows we would have to go to Kanab or over Cedar Breaks which would have taken us 3 or 4 hours. To make matters worse the car at the bottom was designed for 6 and we had 8 people. We really had to make it back before 8:00 PM. From about 5:00 PM we didn’t stop for any breaks just continued fighting the rocks and currents. We were all excited to see the River Side hike – It meant just one more mile to the Zion busses which would take us back to our car. Thankfully the River Side Walk is not in the river. Without stopping to empty the sand or rocks from our shoes we walked as fast as we could to the busses. By the time we were on the bus most of us had our shoes off. The time was 7:35 pm the bus ride to our car was 35 minutes. That means we would be 10 minutes too late to make it back up the canyon. We were all still very hopeful. The car was parked right next to the start of the road closure. We had a plan, Nate had to run to the start of the construction site and beg them to let us through while the rest of us ran to the can and pilled in. The construction workers said no but the park ranger who was in charge of getting all the cars out of the road construction said we could follow him to the other side. You could imagine our relief. One more problem, Lolly’s car was parked in the middle of the construction site and we were worried that they wouldn’t let her go back meaning she would have to drive to Kanab then home to Hurricane. So we came up with another plan. She was parked just outside of the long tunnel. Bryce was driving and would let park ranger get some distance between us and just at the end of the tunnel we would let the ranger pull ahead of us a ways, allowing time for Lolly to jump out the car in the middle of the road and walk to her car. The park ranger stopped at Lollys car and we wondered if he saw Lolly jump out. But he didn’t. He was more concerned about Lolly’s car being in the construction site. So he let us through – we left Lolly to fend for herself. Luckily the park ranger was really nice and just told her to head home. We were all really cramped in the car and the ride to the top of the Narrows were we left our car was about 45 minutes on a dirt road. We decided to let Nate and Bryce get the cars while the rest of us hung out on the road eating yummy potato salad and watermelon and watching a movie. We were all wet and freezing – Good thing we all had long sleeve shirts in plastic baggies. Bryce gave Celeste his emerge blanked which she quite enjoyed. It took Nate and Bryce more than an hour to get our cars. It was very dark and just before they arrived we alerted someone who was passing by that we were nervous about our situation. They said they would come back to check on us – even put us up for the night in the lodge if we needed it. I think it was close to 10:00 pm before we finally headed back to the Ranch. I called to check on Lolly shortly after we started heading back to the ranch (She was already home and showered by that time) we arrived at the cabin around 11:30 pm. It was a long day but in my opinion well worth it and would definitely do it again.

It took us 17 hours to drive to Zion, get the cars where they needed to be and do the hike.

Note to self – It would be well worth the money to pay someone to drop you off at the top of the Narrows. Put dry clothes in the car that you leave in Zion Park. Having dinner in the car was a great idea too. Tennis shoes and hiking sticks are a must (although next time I would like to try some water sandals – but bring my tennis shoes as well). Jean shorts and a tee-shirt did not dry out very well and were very heavy when wet. I think a comfortable swim suit and shorts that dry out fast would be a good idea. Bring ibuprofen. Band-aids don’t stick on wet skin and are pretty much worthless. I didn’t need as much water as I thought I would. Even though it was 104 degrees in Zion it was not hot in the Narrows. I drank about 50 ounces of water (2 and ½ bottles). We put long sleeve shirts in the