Recovering from yesterday’s Imlay sneak route w Ram, Brendan Busch, Dean Brooks and Stefanos Folias. Thanks to Jenny for dropping us off. 14 hours pavement to pavem… wait, in Zion, that is not a good way to say it. 14 hours vehicle to vehicle. For the first time in maybe 5 years, Imlay is REAL. As in, like itself. The last couple of years, Imlay has been pretty mellow and Ram and I took preparations rather casually. Thankfully Brendan had a Talon in his pack that proved very useful. We did some throwing, some hooking, some swimming and pushing. Many spots have been substantially re-arranged, and quite a bit of sand, which made the potholes shallower (and thus easier), has blown out.
I’ll get a fuller report with pics out this evening or manana, but just so you know:
Imlay is BACK!
Tom
p.s.: check Candition before heading out!
Dan Ransom
Are we sharing Imlay epics? First time I ever did it, a gal went hypothermic on us. Finally convinced her to strip off her (wet) clothes from under her leaky drysuit 5 potholes from the end. I put my dry fleece on her, and I finished the canyon with bare skin and a drysuit. Landed in the narrows at 9:08 pm. Ran (head over heels a few times) to the Temple of Sinawava. No people or bus in sight. I began running down the road, glimpsed some brake lights in the distance. Flashed my headlamp at them, they waited. It was the bus, picking up another few stragglers at about 10:10 pm. I nearly passed out when I boarded the bus, shirtless, carrying my drysuit over my shoulder. Returned with the car. Never saw the hypothermic gal again.
ratagonia
October 2001 – first full Imlay, second time in the canyon at all, with Scott Holley and a friend of his just off the PCT. One car trip from SLC, so we left the car and all gear at Lava Point, 4 am start, expecting to bivy in the canyon… It went better than that, got the 9:00 bus out of the T of S and into town. Figured we’d get a motel room and figure it out in the morning – whoops, St George Marathon weekend, not a room to be had in town! The Spit and Purrrr had a band that night, so the kitchen closed early. Beers and chips and salsa for dinner, then a bivy on the concrete slab behind the Mean Bean (no upstairs at that time). Never has an Ambien been so useful.
T
Mike
First trip to Utah in 08, full Imlay day, 3 noobs to pothole escape. Got to the temple at 1am (this was before the big nice bathrooms), tried to sleep, walked to the next shuttle stop, tried to sleep, and so on. Finally we got to the lodge. Crashed on the couches, slept for 30 minutes, woke up and people were grabbing coffee and watching the sunrise. It was a good one.
2065toyota
We got picked up by the rangers at about 1 a.m. one night after we missed the last bus and just decided to sleep on one of the benches. He gave us a ride down to our car and let us drive back up in to pick everybody up.
John Diener
Not surprised to hear you were prepared, Brendan! So a couple of questions… was the water high enough that one hook placement got you by, or what did you do? What kinds of things would you have tried without the talon?
-john
Ram
We tossed one hole and could have done others but it would have been challenging to get sand to all the right places. The throws were not short and most important, it would have been slower, resulting in getting colder and maybe missing that last bus. As we begged the bus driver (Steve) to “wait just a little while longer,” I asked those on the bus….”Guess what happens if you miss the last bus?” Many chimed in wanting to know. I pointed to the bathrooms and told them….”bathroom bivy!” The crowd moaned . I hear the rangers are not allowed to pick you up walking the road too! Ugh!
ratagonia
I have no idea how this ugly rumor got started. I have always had good luck getting rides from the rangers. In a small way, that is their job – to assist visitors in enjoying the Park.
Tom
Ram
Glad to hear otherwise. Two folks on the bus that night said it was against regulations and they were denied and had to walk.
ratagonia
Ahem…
Well, let me qualify previous blanket statement. NPS personnel other than Law Enforcement Rangers may be prohibited from picking up citizens – insurance issues.
Once we were hiking out the MIA road, dead tired (of course), when a small pickup with three NPS Biologists came by. We chatted a little bit, then they denied us a ride – no available seat belts, agin regulations, that kind of thing. We were disappointed. They drove off. Five minutes later, they drove back. Reason had asserted itself. We promised to not fall out, and not to tell. (Statute of limitations has expired).
Tom
sail2fast
BTW: Brendan’s Law of doing canyons with Famous Guide Book Authors: bring the union of [set of gear that FGBA sez we need] + [set of gear that said Guide Book sez we need]. Hooking out of potholes with one hook is like clapping with one hand…
sail2fast
In Pine Creek some (new) webbing was very poorly tied at one rappel, causing it to chafe excessively on one hanger. I fumbled with it a bit, but didn’t replace it figuring someone would. 8 days later I gave a ride to someone who said it was still the same, but chafed half way through (he didn’t replace it either). Pine Creek sees how many people / day? At least when this webbing cuts through, the backup bolt might take the shock load that is going to occur.
2065toyota
“Short version: Imlay is Back; water was low enough to be fun and challenging; don’t rap off frayed webbing, please!”
Same situation in Englestead yesterday. Some webbing at the rap ring was worn half way through and people were still using. We replaced them
ratagonia
Crazy! You’d expect people doing Englestead (and Imlay) to be a little more savvy.
joeb
Actually “Tom’s Law of Pothole Escapes” sounds like a offshoot of “My wife thinks I’m a bumbling idiot desperately in need of advice on any home improvement project”.
ratagonia
Manana took a while… Not a very inspiring set of pics as I was not really into it, brought the little waterproof camera, there was not much light and I did a poor job of cleaning the lens, so we got the old 70’s soft-focus effect, mostly. In other words, the usual excuses.
Ram and those guys did Full Left Fork the day before, so we got kind of a late start. Without the pass, we were waiting on the first bus which this time of year is 7 am. Yikes! A kind person braved the wrath of the rangers and drove us in at 6:30, so we hit the trail at 7 am, about 2 hours later than the usual summer Imlay Sneak.
The flowers out are amazing. Here’s some Penstemon laevis. The Palmer’s were out too – seems a little early for them…
Strange to hike up Angel’s in the light. This was Brendan’s first trip to Zion, so he and Dean dashed off to summit A.L. while us slow pokes poked our way up the trail. We waited for them at the small bridge over a branch of Telephone. Here’s Ram and Stefan in animated discusson.
We then proceeded on the right hand Sneak route. Thankfully, in mid-May the sun is not all that high, so we had pleasant temperatures for most of the up-hill sections. Here’s another flower we saw a bunch of in there, a new species to me, looks similar to a Colomia; ID’d as Valeriana arizonica.
We slid down into the canyon and walked down into this former log-soup area to get away from the mosquitoes and gnats, and suited up. The canyon would prove to be somewhat drier than expected.
Then into the canyon. Only a few very short sections of log soup, and none that were swimmer. There was some pretty good light bouncing around up above. The water seemed really cold. There were quite a few significant changes from last summer. The birth canal was choked with log debris, forcing us to go higher and rap down the other side. Several potholes required hooking to get out… thinking the canyon would be fullish, I was foolish and did not bring a hooking kit. We did not even have an etrier! Thankfully Brendan had a Talon in his pack and he put it to good use. A little more gear would have made this a lot easier and a lot faster!
Brendan and Dean setting up a rappel.
For the last couple of years, sand had washed in from the wildfire-burnt slopes above, and Imlay has been mild – not really like itself. But now, yeah, Imlay is BACK! More potholes, Brendan thrutching out with his single hook – and we were at the mid-point break and warming up in the sun.
Dean climbing out of a pothole.
Stefan hand-lining a short drop.
The big potholes out near the end proved to be troublesome, taking a lot of time and effort. Since this was Brendan’s and Stefan’s first trip through Imlay they got to be out front solving problems. Hanging in the back I formulated a new Tom’s Law of Pothole Escapes:
a. If you are in the front working the problem, you are creative, high-energy, getting lots of stuff done, moving quickly and efficiently – and solving the problem as fast as humanly possible;
b. If you are in the back, observing, the people in front are slow, unimaginative, trying things that obviously won’t work, fumbling with their gear, and generally taking as long as humanly possible to finally get out of the pothole in the way it was obvious to try all along…
People in front “working” on the next pothole, though it really looks like they are just standing around.
At least, that’s the way it FEELS!
Eventually, cold and tired, we get to the last rap, descend, hike down the Narrows, and catch the infamous LAST BUS! This time of year, that was 9:30.
Ram at the last rap.
—-
One curious and dangerous thing noticed: On several rappels, the black 11/16″ webbing I placed last year was frayed on one end, frayed back to the knot. Call me paranoid if you wish, but I think when the fray goes into the knot, the rigging is no longer safe and must be replaced. I am always a bit disappointed in the casual attitude many people have towards anchor webbing, especially when they are tired and cold… I’m sure many people rapped off these with the webbing frayed back. I replaced 2 or 3 of them with fresh webbing.
Don’t rappel on this!
Short version: Imlay is Back; water was low enough to be fun and challenging; don’t rap off frayed webbing, please!
ratagonia
Oh, and, Last Bus from Temple of Sinawava now, in May, is 9:30 pm – PROMPT! I’m glad the gal from the group coming out of Mystery told me, or I would of dawdled my way back.
Tom
Mountaineer
Awesome, great work to you all. Ha ha, so the canyon rating needs to be changed?
Stevee B
Wait, Stefan??
ratagonia
A blast from the past!!!