Bogley

[seb42]

Our group of eight (8) finished off a great week in Zion on Friday (June 27th) by doing the top-down Orderville Canyon route. This was a first time for everyone in the entire group. Thanks to Joe Braun, Bo Beck, Tanya, and Tom Jones for their excellent trip reports an beta information.

We had two vehicles so shuttling people was not a problem although the day was long by the time we returned to our cabin in Duck Creek Village. We dropped our smaller vehicle at Zion's parking area and ran our group up to North Fork road. We arrived at the trail head (Jeep road) about 10am. We make quick time and headed down the Jeep road and into the beginning of Oderville Canyon. With every step the views became more spectacular! The first obstacle (chockstone) was a welcome change to our quick paced hiking. We quickly made our way down the chockstone and on to the guillotine (double chockstone). Just before our second obstacle we grabbed a quick bite and energy boost! Leading up to the guillotine we began seeing traces of water (not too much mud as it must have been pretty dry). The Virgin River was running at 42 or 43 cfs that day…pretty low since the last time we tried to do Orderville in May of '06 in which the Virgin at the Narrows was around 150 cfs.

We enjoyed the second obstacle and were anxious to get into the "Water Park". Each subsequent obstacle was a little challenge in its own way and everyone in the group did fabulous (ages 42, 42, 41, 37, 27, 15, 11, 11). As we approached the obstacle just prior to Veiled Falls we began seeing Bottom-up hikers as they were watching us navigate our way down. It was certainly nice to catch the sun's rays and we got to Veiled Falls. We…as noobies to Oderville…stopped for a moment as we were looking for our way down. We knew to look for the Moki steps and soon found them. The first in our party navigated their way down fine…I was next. I did not do so well as my foot slipped on the second step. Aside from a face first flop into the water…I was fine. We helped the rest of the party make their way down safely!

From here on out it was a beautiful finish to a beautiful day! We were tired and hungry, but loved every minute of the adventure. We finished the Riverside Walk mile and were on the shuttle back to our car at 7:30pm (8.5 hrs total). During our drive back up the North Fork road and then back to Zion to pick up the remaining group we wondered if getting a shuttle service would have been better. By the time we got back to Duck Creek Village it was 11pm. TIME TO EAT!!! Especially true for the young canyoneers-in-training in our group they are now debating which experience they enjoyed most that week (Subway or Oderville). We will be back!

[nat]

Nice TR and excellent photos! :2thumbs: Orderville from the top is one of my favorite canyons in Zion.

Nat

[Jaxx]

Great TR, love the pics.