Paria Canyon - THE WAVE

  Glendale, Utah, United States
Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Now THIS is one day to be recorded for ever in memory! This is the day of The Wave! Wow, wow and double wow!

The ranger had provided us with instructions on how to get to The Wave but we have to say, his idea of instructions, and OUR idea of instructions, are two different things! Firstly, we had to go a different route to that normally taken because the road had been washed out due to flood. Long story short however, after having done an additional 40 miles that we need not have done, we eventually ended up at the trailhead.

Now you are provided with a set of photographs and instructions to follow because there is no trail to speak of.

The Wave

You sort of just follow the pictures and look for what looks similar in the area and head for it. After walking for about 90 minutes to 2 hours, you come to jaw dropping beauty! In fact, Zion pales into insignificance. We just sat there and took in the beauty of this place.

The Wave

We spent a couple of hours in this area,

The Wave

just looking at the various structures around. Having permits allocated to people meant that only 20 people per day could come here and at the time, there was just us and two others. We had met up with some hikers on their way out so by the time we got there, we had the serenity to enjoy.

The Wave

On the way back, we got lost and ended up on a ridge of slickrock. There was a moment there that we panicked with the thought of how the heck we were going to get down. But we did. All of us fried too! Little wonder because it was hiking totally on rock so not only did we have the reflected heat to contend with, but also there were no trees for shade. Again, a great day though and really thankful we had managed to get a permit.

Then it was a mad rush to pick up wet walking gear because tomorrow we are doing the Virgin Narrows hike. Will be great fun.