Subway Hike Zion

I recently went on a hike in Zion National park with some good friends: Andrea, Stewart, Shana, Landon, Christine, Richard, and Patrick. This was an absolutely amazing hike 2 hours outside of town in Utah's Zion National Park. Consisting of roughly 15 miles, down into and though a canyon then back out finally exiting the most intense switch backs I have been on. We left Las Vegas at 4am ish, perfect for myself because I stay up late, but also terrible because I received 20 minutes of sleep prior to leaving. The drive went smoothly until in St. George both cars received a ticket for doing 79 in a 60. But the cop was a huge discounter and gave us both 5 over tickets. This was the biggest jerk move I have seen in awhile, we were following Stewart when the cop pulled behind us and threw his lights on. We began to merge to the right when the cop flew around us and pulled Stewart over. We weren’t about to get a gun pulled on us so we went around them and waiting about 50 feet in front of Stewart. The cop wrote his ticket then pulled us over and gave the exact same ticket, like I said he was a huge discounter "lucky us". After this we arrived at the gate at Zion where the ranger told us we shouldn't do the hike because the water was frigid, interesting enough we brought wet suits, but he urged us not to do it without dry suits too. This was perfect because the trip had already went through around 5 stages of getting called off then going.

Now for the hike:

The trek to the canyon was easy, few miles of level-ish land down some sandstone, which killed the knee's and calf's. Then when we began to descend into the canyon we went down the wrong side, which was intense it dropped straight off. Perfect because I had moderate difficulty when trying to make this descend hahah. Once we were in the canyon it was gorgeous, small pools and streams throughout. Then we began to get to some swimming parts, which made everyone alil uneasy. Wetsuits went on and the first full swim took place, some thought the water was extremely cold I found it quite refreshing. One portion of the swimming parts you have to descend down a small waterfall into a 5' wide canyon full of water for about 70' of only swimming. It was so intense and beautiful. After this portion hypothermia began to set in, in myself while we were waiting in shaded areas for the group in front of us to repel. Nothing is better than shaking uncontrollably, while waiting to do a small repel. After this part of repelling we reached the portions of the hike which it had been "nick-named" after, the canyon walls were shaped exactly like a subways walls. Once we completely exited the canyon it was wet suits off and a eternal hike through the canyon to the switch backs, this portion of the hike turned into a little death. Continuous crossing of the river, walking over and on rocks. Finally we found the switch backs after being separate from our group, good thing because the sun was beginning to set. This portion was the most stamina intense and most enjoyable for myself, really pushed your legs hard trying to get yourself out of this canyon on straight vertical switch backs.

All in all it was an absolutely amazing hike, a top twenty lifetime experience for some. I enjoyed myself to the fullest esp. for only having an hours sleep for it. I am so looking forward to the next time we trek through the subway at Zion!

I tried to place as many pictures as I could, because this is the only way you can really get an idea of the hike