When the Trail Ends, the Fun Begins! (Fay Canyon, part 2)

[canyonwalker]

Sedona Travelog #5
Sedona, AZ - Sat, 28 May 2022, 2pm

I split up my blog about hiking Fay Canyon into two parts. That's partly because there are so many pictures I want to share and partly because the hike itself had two parts. In part 1, we hiked the trail to its end through a beautiful canyon. Then the trail ended. Technically.



The trail ended just shy of a dry creek crossing. A wooden "END OF TRAIL" sign was nailed to a tree. Beyond the creek was a fascinating red rock cliff. Its lower reaches were clearly climbable. ...In fact, not even climbable but scramble-able. You see, I define "climbing" as using ropes, clamps, and other technical gear to scale or descend a surface. When all you're using is hands and feet, that's scrambling. If you're not using your hands, it's walking. 😂

With that, we walked across the dry creek bed and started scrambling— but still mostly walking— up the cliff.



Climbing Walking up these slanted surfaces can seem scary to the uninitiated. It's actually easier than it looks. Although the surface is called slickrock, it's actually pretty grippy. That means if you have good tread on your boots, or even sturdy sneakers, your feet will stick to the rocks even on steep inclines. ...Unless there's sand or loose rubble on the rock; then watch out!



As we climbed up around the redrock bluff we saw a whole new dimension to Fay Canyon. This is the upper canyon beyond us.



And, of course, the view back out over where we've come from is picturesque, too.

Comments

[sorcyress]

I quite like the distinction of _scrambling_ vs climbing, perhaps in part because I am very very very much a fan of scrambling. It is a well established fact that if you go on a hike with me I will attempt to be on top of every big rock I see, at least for a moment. (I can be distracted from this goal with bugs)

~Sor

[canyonwalker]

My main reason for the distinction, aside from it being fun, is that when a sign says NO CLIMBING I can still scramble because that's not prohibited.