Slickrock and Shadow

  Orderville Canyoneering:  a memorable day in a good life! Orderville Canyon trail report and advice for anyone looking for adventure.  This is a sweet hike with some fun canyoneering daring requiring swimming, rappelling, jumping into cold pools and more.  The hike does require a PERMIT from the Zion backcountry office.  You can take as many as 12 people in a group.  Our group had 11 at the beginning . . . and 11 at the end!  Success! Start you hike first by leaving a car at the Zion visitor center early in the day.  Then travel to the trailhead in the high eastern plateau above Zion Ponderosa ranch resort.  It's an easy dirt road when it is dry.   The fun begins with a descent down a rough dirt road for 1-2 miles.  Then the trail becomes obvious and drops deeper into the canyon after 1 mile.  Here is where the beauty of a slot canyon begins:  the sandstone walls draw closer and big pine trees hang to the cracks in...

Secret Waterfall, Zion National Park Keeping secrets is fun if you know that your secret is highly desired by others.  I discovered a secret waterfall in Zion National Park and it is so much fun and such a wonderful find, that I have to post something about it.  However I will keep its location a secret.  What I will share is how beautiful it is.  I want to share the beauties of nature and how I can best capture it with photography. This particular waterfall was reached after hiking several hours.  There is no trail.  There is no trail head.  It was simply a rumor.  I can say that along the way I saw several small fish in the stream, climbed over multiple boulders, crisscrossed from side to side of the water countless times.  The journey was mostly enjoyable. As I was approaching the end of this hike, I saw the split waterfalls noted above.  My heart leapt with excitement.  I spent a couple of hours here taking a lot of photogr...