UT: Zion Full Left Fork 4-14-13

As good as it gets. I return over and over again. On this day, I have 3 folks who have never been. Bill Aho, Jenny West and Brendan Busch set to go! It is time for the FULL Left Fork and just for giggles...via the Hammerhead. Years ago, people started requesting a permit for Das Boot. The park complied by making it a separate permit EVEN THOUGH it is nothing more than an eight tenths of one mile addition to the standard Left Fork route. I went to the desk and asked for a Full Left Fork. One canyon, one permit. The fact that I use the Hammerhead variation to get there is none of their damn business. DON"T start asking for it. Or they will truly "GIVE IT TO YOU!"

The 4 mile hike to Potato Hollow was accomplished in first light and a short bushwhack up, over and down to the head of the Hammerhead followed. Landslides make the entry a tad more challenging. No evidence that anyone has been through this year. Many anchors need rebuilding. As is usual, we encountered snow in the canyon. The Hammerhead is actually the highest point in the Right Fork drainage, but it comes down and turns almost at the height of land between the Left and the Right Forks so I have taken to descending the canyon no matter which fork is on tap for the day. Near the left turn into the Right Fork, exit on the bench right on open slopes, find the rotting tree over the jungle, balance over it and up the slope 50 vertical feet and voila! Your in the Left Fork drainage. Procede a bit over a mile to the Seeps entry and suit up. You have almost 5 miles of water park ahead of you. The upper section is very wet and mostly friendly, with much sun. One section changes every year. Logs and sand fill the dark and foreboding hallways in new and creative ways every time you go.

Then it is Das Boot section...but it is later in the day than you have been before. A dark, wet and cold section normally, the later hour fills some sections with sunlight. It feels so different and it is prettier with the light. So says I! By the time you get to the Subway section, the place is often deserted, folks long gone. Alas that was not to be the case this time. A group destined for rescue had taken 4.5 hours to get to the 3 miles to Left Fork at Russell Gulch. We convinced them to head back up.We heard later they still needed fetching. We passed others. We politely asked if they had headlamps. They did. We passed many others uncertain of finding the exit up and out. "Look for the lower wall of black rock." We hit the parking lot and run the shuttle. It has taken us about 12 hours. We have to get organized. Our Imlay trip is less than 12 hours away. Pictures?

Impossible to find the RSS link

First off it was 5-14-13, not April. It was a great day. I miss being out with these 3 amigos. My old Picasa account is owned by Google now so no active link on the above post. I am just going to post water pictures of the section from the Seeps to the start of Das Boot to compliment a parallel discussion of the Upper Upper Left of North and to get some of the pictures on this trip report. As the first paragraph on the above post says....Watch what you ask for.