exploration

We explored some places we had never been to. A couple small slots and a fun trail to a little waterfall. It had the perfect swimming hole spot to jump on in and test out the water. The smartest wisest ones of the group (the guys) found a 2nd spot that was sure to be crowd pleaser. About a 15 ft jump into a teacup of water...luckily no one was hospitalized. The water seemed pretty chilly but it had nothing on the keyhole water that was yet to come.

(The girls of the trip. After our brave cliff jump/swim)

The Keyhole

This little adventure through the keyhole slot was suppose to take a couple hours to do...but somehow between all of our sweet map reading skills we ended up on just a small 5 hour detour through hoodoo canyon. (that was awesome, nothing better than a good old detour) The hoodoo canyon was pretty cool but by the time we turned ourselves around and started descending down the keyhole we were pretty wiped. The keyhole was short and exciting and had so many enchanting areas. There was also a present waiting for us inside. Ice cold water pretty much the whole way that could have easily put me into a coma, or at the very least caused the loss of limbs. I think the beauty kept me alive. (when they say you might need a wet-suit I guess they mean it!) The last swim was long really long....can't see the end...still can't see the end..maybe around the next bend... this dry bag(used as a floating device) is saving my life long. Like this except no wet suit and none of us could touch the bottom. Sunshine has never felt so good. We could not get any pictures inside the canyon. 1) The camera was tucked nice and warm in the dry bag. 2) Our fingers were too cold to retrieve it 3) We were in a hurry to see the sun. So the linked pictures will have to do. So after all of that the mystery remains. Why was that so fun? In fact it was a blast. Maybe it was because I haven't had an adventure like that for a while. I felt like I was 20 again...but I wasn't so I woke up the next day sore as could be just in time for the subway.

At first Ali was trying to avoid all the water by pulling off fancy stunt jumps like this. Little did she know she was still going to go swimming at least a dozen times. Oh well, it made a cool picture.

(hoodoo canyon)