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Hikers wading up the Virgin River between the towering walls of the Zion Narrows

Duck Creek Guide

The Zion Narrows

There is no trail. The Virgin River is the route, and how far you go is entirely your decision.

Most famous hikes are a path you follow. This one is a river you walk up. The Virgin River has spent a long time cutting a slot through Navajo sandstone, and for the last mile of Zion Canyon the walls stand close enough that there is no room left for a bank — so you walk in the water, upstream, for as long as you feel like it, and then you turn around and walk back.

That last part is what most guides bury and it is the most important thing on this page. There is no summit, no loop and no reward for finishing. A family that wades twenty minutes past the end of the pavement and sits down on a gravel bar has seen the Narrows. So has the person who spent nine hours getting to Big Spring and back. Decide in advance which of those you want to be.

Your call
Anywhere from 2 to 10 miles round trip
Elevation gain
292 ft in 4.49 miles — it is flat
Closes above
150 cfs, by park order
Permit
None, bottom-up to Big Spring
From the inn
58 miles, then a 45-min shuttle

Live, from the gauge and the forecast office

Can you hike the Narrows today?

Three readings decide it, and they come from two different agencies. Here they are side by side.

River flow

1820 cfs

Closed

Above 150 cfs the park closes the Narrows to all travel. Walk the paved Riverside Walk instead and look again tomorrow.

Closure line 150 cfs · USGS 09405500

Water temperature

50 °F

What to wear

Cold. Dry pants or a bib are the difference between a full day and a short one.

Same gauge, same minute. Air temperature in Springdale tells you nothing about this.

Flash flood potential

Expected

Tomorrow: Not Expected

Many slot canyons are expected to flood. This is not a day to be in the Virgin River, whatever the gauge says.

NWS Salt Lake City , issued Nov 1, 2:41 AM MT

The gauge sits at Springdale, below the canyon. A storm twenty miles upstream over country you cannot see will reach you before it reaches the gauge, which is why the forecast matters as much as the number. During a Flash Flood Warning the Narrows closes, and it stays closed for 2 hours after the warning is lifted. Readings refresh when you load the page; flow and temperature last read Nov 1, 11:05 AM MT. Always confirm with current park conditions before you drive down.

Three hikes with one name

Which Narrows are you talking about?

People say “hiking the Narrows” to mean three quite different days out. Nine visitors in ten do the first one, and almost everything you have read about permits and shuttles applies only to the other two.

No permit

Bottom-up day hike

Distance
Up to 10 miles round trip — you choose
Time
1 to 10 hours
Effort
Easy to strenuous, entirely your call
Shape
Out and back from the Temple of Sinawava

Ride the shuttle to the last stop, walk a paved mile, then step into the river and go as far upstream as you feel like before turning around. Nine visitors in ten see the Narrows this way.

Right for: Everyone. First-timers, families, people with one free afternoon, and people who want a full day of it.

The catch: Every mile has to be walked twice, and nobody carries you out. Set a turnaround time before you start and keep it.

Permit required

Top-down in a day

Distance
16 miles, one way
Time
10 to 13 hours of walking
Effort
Strenuous
Shape
Downstream from Chamberlain’s Ranch to the Temple of Sinawava

The whole canyon in one push, walking downstream with the current, finishing on the paved Riverside Walk among day hikers who have no idea where you started.

Right for: Fit hikers who are happy to be on their feet from dawn until evening and have sorted out a ride to the trailhead.

The catch: You need a permit, a shuttle to Chamberlain’s Ranch an hour and a half away, and a plan for finishing after dark. There is no bailout once you commit.

Permit required

Top-down overnight

Distance
16 miles over two days
Time
Two half-ish days
Effort
Strenuous, but humane
Shape
Downstream, with a night at a numbered riverside campsite

The same route with a night in the canyon. You wake up between the walls with the upper Narrows to yourself, and reach the crowds only in the final miles.

Right for: Experienced backpackers willing to plan months ahead for one of the best nights outdoors in the Southwest.

The catch: One night only — multi-night trips are not permitted. Everything you carry in gets carried out wet, including your waste.

The only decision that matters

How far up should you go?

Five honest turnarounds, spaced on the page by the distance actually between them. Every mile you walk upstream you walk again coming back, so pick your point before you start and be at peace with it. Nobody at Big Spring is having a better time than the family eating sandwiches at Mystery Falls.

  1. Mile 0 4,421 ft

    Temple of Sinawava

    Shuttle stop 9

    Shuttle stop 9, the last restrooms and the last drinking water. Fill everything here, because there is nothing above it.

    Right for: Where every version of this hike starts and ends.

  2. Mile 0.94 4,483 ft

    End of the pavement

    Last dry ground

    1.9 mi round trip 1–1.5 hours, there and back

    Hanging gardens dripping off the walls, the river beside you the whole way, and a sandbar at the end where the canyon closes in. No wet feet required.

    Right for: Anyone at all. Strollers, wheelchairs, grandparents, a spare hour before the drive home.

  3. Mile 1.24 4,496 ft

    Mystery Falls

    2.5 mi round trip 2–3 hours, there and back

    Twenty minutes of real wading gets you a waterfall on the wall and the feeling of the canyon closing overhead. Most people who turn around here are glad they came.

    Right for: First-timers, families with school-age children, anyone testing whether they like this.

  4. Mile 2.51 4,590 ft

    Orderville Canyon junction

    Quarter mile up the side canyon

    5.0 mi round trip 4–6 hours, there and back

    The narrowest, most photographed stretch of the canyon starts just above the junction. A quarter mile up Orderville itself is yours to explore without a permit.

    Right for: Steady walkers with a full morning and no dinner reservation.

  5. Mile 2.79 4,605 ft

    Floating Rock

    5.6 mi round trip 5–7 hours, there and back

    Deep inside the narrow reach, walls near a thousand feet, a boulder stranded in mid-channel, and far fewer people than at the junction below.

    Right for: Confident hikers who started at the first shuttle.

  6. Mile 4.49 4,713 ft

    Big Spring

    Turn around — permit country above

    9.0 mi round trip 8–10 hours, there and back

    The whole legal canyon, ending at a spring that bursts out of the wall under hanging ferns. Past this point you need a permit, and the rangers do check.

    Right for: Strong hikers, on the first bus, with lunch in a dry bag and nothing else planned.

4.49 mapped miles each way. Distances are the OpenStreetMap river centreline, measured, with USGS 3DEP elevations. The walk is longer than the line, because the river makes you cross it repeatedly — the National Park Service puts Big Spring at about 4.7 miles upstream and calls the round trip ten. Times are ours, from walking it: roughly a mile an hour going up at ordinary flows, quicker coming down, plus time spent looking up. High water makes every one of them longer.

Drawn to scale, for once

The canyon, and where you are allowed to walk

The handouts in the rental shops are sketched freehand and say “not to scale” in the corner. This is the real geometry. Two boundaries are drawn rather than described, because they are the two people most often get wrong: bottom-up travel ends at Big Spring, and Orderville Canyon is open to you for a quarter of a mile.

The interactive map needs JavaScript. In short: ride the shuttle to stop 9, walk the paved mile of the Riverside Walk, then follow the Virgin River upstream as far as Big Spring, about four and a half miles on.

  • Riverside Walk (paved, 1 mi)
  • The river — no trail, no bridges
  • Orderville: the legal quarter mile
A paved mile, then four and a half miles of river. Tap any pin for what is there and how high it sits. The National Park Service allows bottom-up travel as far as Big Spring and a quarter mile up Orderville Canyon; both boundaries are drawn rather than described. Geometry from OpenStreetMap, elevations from USGS 3DEP. Basemap by CARTO and OpenStreetMap contributors.

Nothing about this hike is uphill

Elevation profile of the Narrows, upstream from the Temple of Sinawava The river rises from 4,421 feet at the Temple of Sinawava to 4,713 feet at Big Spring — 292 feet over 4.49 miles, about 65 feet per mile. The first 0.94 miles are paved and climb 62 feet; everything above is in the water. 4,200 4,300 4,400 4,500 4,600 4,700 4,800 4,900 Paved In the river Temple of Sinawava End of the pavement Mystery Falls Orderville Canyon junction Big Spring 0 mi 4.49 mi upstream 4,200 4,300 4,400 4,500 4,600 4,700 4,800 4,900 1 2 3 4 5 0 mi 4.49 mi
  1. 1Temple of Sinawava 4,421 ft
  2. 2End of the pavement 4,483 ft
  3. 3Mystery Falls 4,496 ft
  4. 4Orderville Canyon junction 4,590 ft
  5. 5Big Spring 4,713 ft
The Narrows is flat. The river gains 292 feet across 4.49 miles — roughly 65 feet a mile, a grade of about one percent, less than the paved Riverside Walk feels like. If you plan this hike on elevation gain you will badly misjudge it. Plan it on hours instead: you are walking against current, on loose cobbles you cannot see, and a mile an hour upstream is a good pace. USGS 3DEP elevations along the OpenStreetMap centreline.

The number everyone is told to check

What a cubic foot per second feels like

Every Narrows guide tells you to check the flow. Almost none of them tell you what the number means once you have it. Here is the scale from a lazy summer trickle up to the line the park draws.

The flag sits at 49 cfs — the median flow for Nov 1–15 across 38 years at this gauge. An ordinary river for the fortnight you are reading this, not today’s reading.

  • 0–40 cfs

    Low and forgiving

    Ankle to shin for most of the way

    Close to a walk on wet gravel. Children manage it, cameras stay dry, and you can cover ground almost at hiking pace.

  • 40–70 cfs

    The usual summer river

    Knee-deep, thigh-deep at the crossings

    What most visitors experience. A stick earns its place, footing takes attention, and progress upstream settles to about a mile an hour.

  • 70–110 cfs

    Pushy

    Thigh to waist in the channel

    The current starts to argue with you. Crossings need a plan, poles help more than they look like they should, and turning back early is no failure.

  • 110–150 cfs

    Strong: experienced legs only

    Waist-deep and shifting

    Open, but hard. Bracing against the current is most of the work, the cobbles move under you, and this is not the day to introduce anyone to the canyon.

  • Over 150 cfs

    Closed by the National Park Service

    Not a question of depth

    Above 150 cfs the Narrows is closed to all travel. Not discouraged — closed. Walk the Riverside Walk instead and try again tomorrow.

A cubic foot per second is about the volume of a basketball moving past you every second. Thirty of them is a stream you barely notice; a hundred and fifty is a river the park will not let you into. The 150 cfs line is the National Park Service’s, and above it the Narrows is closed to all travel rather than merely difficult. The bands below it are ours — the park publishes no intermediate scale, and neither depth nor difficulty is uniform along the canyon. Read them as a starting point, then look at the gauge, the forecast and the people coming back downstream.

Thirty-eight years of the gauge

Which week should you come?

Guides warn that spring runoff “can” close the Narrows. That is true and useless. So we counted: for every fortnight of the year, the share of days since 1989 on which the river ran above the closure line. If you are choosing dates, choose them from this.

How often the Narrows is closed by high water, through the year Share of days above the 150 cfs closure threshold, by half-month, from 13,773 daily readings between 1989 and 2026. The peak is Apr 16–30 at 53.3% of days; the lowest is Sep 16–30 at 0.7%. From July through November every fortnight sits at or below 3%. 0% 15% 30% 45% 60% Jan 1–15: closed on 3% of days Jan 16–31: closed on 2% of days Feb 1–15: closed on 2.6% of days Feb 16–28: closed on 3.8% of days Mar 1–15: closed on 9.8% of days 10% Mar 16–31: closed on 18.6% of days 19% Apr 1–15: closed on 31.8% of days 32% Apr 16–30: closed on 53.3% of days 53% May 1–15: closed on 51.8% of days 52% May 16–31: closed on 28.8% of days 29% Jun 1–15: closed on 21.2% of days 21% Jun 16–30: closed on 10.9% of days 11% Jul 1–15: closed on 1.4% of days Jul 16–31: closed on 1.2% of days Aug 1–15: closed on 1.1% of days Aug 16–31: closed on 2.1% of days Sep 1–15: closed on 3% of days Sep 16–30: closed on 0.7% of days Oct 1–15: closed on 1.8% of days Oct 16–31: closed on 2.2% of days Nov 1–15: closed on 1.1% of days Nov 16–30: closed on 1.1% of days Dec 1–15: closed on 1.3% of days Dec 16–31: closed on 2.7% of days JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec 0% 15% 30% 45% 60% Jan 1–15: closed on 3% of days Jan 16–31: closed on 2% of days Feb 1–15: closed on 2.6% of days Feb 16–28: closed on 3.8% of days Mar 1–15: closed on 9.8% of days Mar 16–31: closed on 18.6% of days Apr 1–15: closed on 31.8% of days Apr 16–30: closed on 53.3% of days May 1–15: closed on 51.8% of days May 16–31: closed on 28.8% of days Jun 1–15: closed on 21.2% of days Jun 16–30: closed on 10.9% of days Jul 1–15: closed on 1.4% of days Jul 16–31: closed on 1.2% of days Aug 1–15: closed on 1.1% of days Aug 16–31: closed on 2.1% of days Sep 1–15: closed on 3% of days Sep 16–30: closed on 0.7% of days Oct 1–15: closed on 1.8% of days Oct 16–31: closed on 2.2% of days Nov 1–15: closed on 1.1% of days Nov 16–30: closed on 1.1% of days Dec 1–15: closed on 1.3% of days Dec 16–31: closed on 2.7% of days JFMAMJJASOND
Each bar is half a month. Height is the share of days on which the North Fork ran above the National Park Service’s 150 cfs closure line, from 13,773 daily readings at gauge 09405500 between 1989 and 2026 — 38 years of snowmelt. Apr 16–30 has been closed on 53.3% of days. From July onward no fortnight in the record exceeds 3%, and Sep 16–30 is the quietest water of the year at 0.7%. This is history, not a forecast: a heavy snow year pushes the spring bars higher and a dry one flattens them.

April and May: the gamble

Snowmelt off the plateau, and the two riskiest fortnights of the year. Late April has been closed on more than half of all days in the record. Beautiful water when it is open, and a coin flip whether it is.

June: the turn

Runoff fades fast. The first half of June still closes about one day in five; by the second half it is one in ten and falling. Water is cold but manageable, and the canyon is not yet at its busiest.

July and August: open, but watch the sky

The river is low and warm and closures are rare. The risk moves from snowmelt to monsoon thunderstorms that build in the afternoon over country you cannot see from the canyon floor. Start early, finish early.

Late September and October: the best of it

Low steady water, the monsoon over, cottonwoods turning, and the shortest closure odds in the whole record — under one percent in the second half of September. If you can choose your dates freely, choose these.

What you actually need

You can hike the Narrows in ordinary clothes on a warm day. You will enjoy it considerably more with four cheap things and one expensive one. Outfitters in Springdale rent the lot, which is usually smarter than buying.

  • Closed-toe shoes you do not mind soaking

    The park is explicit: sandals, Crocs and bare feet are not appropriate. The riverbed is loose cobble the size of grapefruit and it moves underfoot.

  • A stick or trekking poles

    A third point of contact is what keeps you upright in moving water. Borrowed sticks pile up at the end of the pavement; poles are better.

  • Neoprene socks

    They do more for comfort per dollar than anything else on this list, and they stop the cobbles from bruising your feet.

  • Dry pants, bib or suit

    From roughly October through May the water is cold enough that insulation decides how far you get. Rent in Springdale rather than buying.

  • A dry bag

    Assume you will fall in, because a good share of people do. Phone, keys, car fob, lunch, spare layer — all of it inside.

  • All the water you will drink

    There is none in the canyon that is safe, at any depth of filtration. Two litres a person on a hot day is not generous.

  • A wilderness toilet bag

    Required for every hiker. Sold in Springdale and at the visitor center.

  • No cotton

    Wet cotton pulls heat out of you and never dries in a canyon that sees an hour of sun. Synthetics or wool.

The water, not the air

A hundred degrees in Springdale tells you nothing about a canyon you will stand in for six hours. These are the park’s own seasonal water temperatures; the live reading from the gauge is at the top of this page.

  • Summer

    56–68 °F 13–20 °C

    Most people are comfortable in shorts and river shoes. Neoprene socks still make a long day better.

  • Spring and fall

    41–53 °F 5–12 °C

    Cold enough to matter over several hours. Dry pants or a dry bib are the difference between a good day and a short one.

  • Winter

    38–45 °F 3–7 °C

    A drysuit is the sensible minimum, and the canyon is in shadow all day. Plan on going less far than you think.

Uncontrollable shivering, stumbling, slurred speech and confusion are hypothermia, and they arrive in a cold canyon on a warm day more often than people expect. Turning around is always the right answer.

Straight from the park’s regulations

Six rules, two of which most guides get wrong

We checked these against the National Park Service regulation page rather than against other guides, and two came back different from what gets repeated everywhere.

  • Everyone carries out solid human waste

    Not just permit holders — every hiker, in a wilderness toilet bag. This is the rule most often missed, and the reason the canyon is still pleasant to be in. Pick bags up in Springdale before you go.

  • Bottom-up travel stops at Big Spring

    About 4.7 miles upstream. Beyond it you are in permit-only wilderness, and the boundary is checked.

  • A quarter mile up Orderville Canyon, no further

    You will read half a mile in plenty of places. The park’s regulation says a quarter mile from the junction; going further needs a canyoneering permit.

  • Groups of twelve at most above Orderville

    And a group means everyone travelling together on the same day, even if you booked separate permits.

  • Never drink the river

    Cyanobacteria are present in the Virgin River and ordinary backcountry filters do not remove the toxins they produce. Carry all the water you will drink.

  • One night, no fires, no tubes

    Multi-night trips through the Narrows are not permitted, campfires are banned throughout the Zion wilderness, and inflatable tubes are not allowed on the river.

Rules as published by the National Park Service: Narrows regulations.

The permit version

Top-down: 16 miles from Chamberlain’s Ranch

Start above the canyon and walk the whole thing downstream. It is the better hike and much the harder day: a permit, a ride to a remote trailhead an hour and a half from Springdale, and no way out once you have started. Our measurement of the mapped route comes to 15.99 miles against the park’s stated 16, losing 1,430 feet along the way.

  1. Mile 0 5,851 ft

    Chamberlain’s Ranch

    Permit and a ride required

    Dirt lot, no water, no phone signal. The road in is the part that closes.

  2. Mile 2.80 5,634 ft

    Bulloch’s cabin reach

    The road becomes a track, the track becomes a meadow, and the stream you have been following turns into the river.

  3. Mile 8.90 4,955 ft

    Deep Creek

    Volume roughly doubles here. Most parties take lunch, rinse their socks and let their feet dry for twenty minutes.

  4. Mile 9.80 4,903 ft

    Kolob Creek

    The upper canyon at its best, and usually the quietest hour of the day.

  5. Mile 10.90 4,779 ft

    Goose Creek

    The last tributary above the permit line.

  6. Mile 11.50 4,713 ft

    Big Spring

    Day hikers rejoin here

    You rejoin the day hikers here. From this point the canyon is busy and the walking is familiar.

  7. Mile 13.50 4,590 ft

    Orderville Canyon

    Through the narrow reach, now going downstream, which is markedly faster.

  8. Mile 15.10 4,483 ft

    End of the pavement

    Dry ground at last, and a mile of flat paving to the bus.

  9. Mile 15.99 4,421 ft

    Temple of Sinawava

    Shuttle stop 9. Sixteen miles by the park’s reckoning, and 15.99 by ours.

15.99 mapped miles, one way. The same measuring, the other way. Chained end to end the mapped route comes to 15.99 miles against the National Park Service’s stated 16 — which is the agreement that makes the landmarks in between worth quoting. You lose 1,430 feet over the day.

Getting the permit

Through-hike in a day

Cost
$6 application or reservation fee, plus $10 per person
In advance
Reserve at least one day ahead
Lottery
Daily lottery two days before your date, open midnight to 3:00 pm Mountain Time
Last chance
First-come, first-served in person the day before

Through-hike with a night in the canyon

Cost
$20 per permit, plus $7 per person per night
In advance
Reserve at least one day ahead
Lottery
Seasonal lottery and calendar reservations through the park’s wilderness system
Last chance
Walk-in the day before, or early on the morning of the trip

Applications go through the park’s wilderness reservation system. Fees and timings from the NPS permits page.

The variable nobody can plan around is the road to Chamberlain’s Ranch. In heavy snow years it has stayed impassable into July; in dry ones it is open almost all year. There is no reliable way to know more than about a month ahead, and we do not run a shuttle there.

The interactive map needs JavaScript. In short: ride the shuttle to stop 9, walk the paved mile of the Riverside Walk, then follow the Virgin River upstream as far as Big Spring, about four and a half miles on.

  • Riverside Walk (paved)
  • Bottom-up, no permit
  • Top-down, permit only
  • Orderville: the legal quarter mile
The whole canyon: 16 miles from Chamberlain's Ranch to the last shuttle stop, with the permit-free lower section drawn separately. The top-down route needs a permit, a ride to the trailhead and a full day. Geometry from OpenStreetMap; basemap by CARTO and OpenStreetMap contributors.

From 8,400 feet

A Narrows day from Duck Creek Village

A summer plan that works. In spring and autumn shift it an hour later and the light is better anyway.

  1. Leave the inn at 6:00 am

    Highway 14 east, US-89 south, then SR-9 west through the east entrance: 58 miles and about an hour and a half, dropping four and a half thousand feet.

    Fuel at Mount Carmel Junction if you need it. There is none inside the park.

    The east entrance drive

  2. Park at the visitor center by 7:30

    Private cars cannot drive up the canyon in shuttle season, so the lot at the visitor center is where the driving ends. It fills early in summer; Springdale parking and the town shuttle are the backup.

  3. Ride the shuttle to the last stop

    No ticket and no reservation for the canyon shuttle, just the entrance fee. It is about 45 minutes to the Temple of Sinawava, stop 9, with eight stops before it.

    First bus of the day leaves around 7:00 am.

  4. Walk the paved mile first

    The Riverside Walk: hanging gardens, alcoves, the river beside you, and a steady trickle of people turning back at the end of the pavement. Restrooms and water are at the trailhead, not beyond it.

  5. Into the river by nine

    Morning light in the canyon is indirect and even, and the crowds thin the further up you go. Set your turnaround time now and write it on your hand if you have to.

  6. Why noon is the hinge of the day

    Midday is the only hour the sun reaches the floor of the narrow section, and it is also when monsoon storms build upstream. Being on your way back by early afternoon solves both.

  7. Back up the mountain by five

    Ninety minutes of climbing and you are back at 8,400 feet, where a summer evening runs about twenty degrees cooler than the canyon you just left.

    Rooms at the inn

If the canyon is closed

It happens, mostly in spring, and it is not a wasted day. The paved Riverside Walk stays open and is beautiful in its own right. So is everything on the east side of the park, which needs no shuttle at all — and the drive back up the mountain passes a good deal of country that does not care what the river is doing.

  • Walk the Riverside Walk anyway. High water in the Narrows makes for a loud, dramatic river beside the pavement.
  • Canyon Overlook, five minutes from the east portal of the tunnel: one mile round trip for the best view-per-step in the park.
  • The east side of the park, where your own car takes you to every stop and the shuttle is irrelevant.
  • Cedar Breaks, half an hour from the inn, where the hoodoos are at 10,000 feet and entirely unaffected by the Virgin River.

The east entrance Other Zion hikes Cedar Breaks

September 2026

How this page was made

We run an inn an hour and a half up the mountain from the east entrance, and we send guests down to the Narrows all season. The distances here are measured from OpenStreetMap geometry with USGS elevations rather than copied from other guides, and they are checked against the figures the National Park Service publishes. The flow history is 13,773 daily readings from the gauge at Springdale. Where the park publishes a number we use the park’s; where we are giving you our own judgement we say so. Conditions change daily, so treat the live panel as a starting point and the park’s own conditions page as the last word.

Questions people ask us before they go

The ones that come up at the front desk, answered with the numbers behind them.

Do I need a permit to hike the Narrows?

Not for the popular version. Walking upstream from the Temple of Sinawava is permit-free as far as Big Spring, about 4.7 miles up. You only need a permit to start at the top, at Chamberlain’s Ranch, and walk the whole canyon downstream.

How far up should we actually go?

Pick a turnaround before you start. Twenty minutes past the end of the pavement gets you Mystery Falls and the feeling of the canyon closing in — plenty for most families. Four to six hours round trip reaches the Orderville Canyon junction, where the narrowest stretch begins. Big Spring is a full day, eight to ten hours, and there is no shortcut back.

When is the Narrows closed?

Whenever the river runs above 150 cubic feet per second, and during any flash flood warning plus 2 hours after it is lifted. Across 38 years of gauge records, late April has been over the line on 53% of days and late September on 0.7%. Spring runoff is the closure season; July through November is nearly always open.

What do I actually need to wear?

Closed-toe shoes you do not mind soaking — the park says sandals, Crocs and bare feet are not appropriate — plus a stick or poles, no cotton, and a dry bag. From roughly October through May the water is cold enough that dry pants or a bib decide how far you get. Outfitters in Springdale rent all of it.

Can I drink the river water?

No, and not with a filter either. Cyanobacteria in the Virgin River produce toxins that ordinary backcountry filtration does not remove. Carry everything you will drink.

Is it true everyone has to carry out their waste?

Yes — every hiker, not only permit holders. The park requires solid human waste to be carried out in a wilderness toilet bag. Pick one up in Springdale or at the visitor center before you get on the shuttle.

How long does it take to get there from Duck Creek Village?

About an hour and a half to the visitor center — 58 miles and roughly 96 minutes by way of the east entrance and the tunnel — then a 45-minute shuttle ride to the last stop. Leaving the inn at six gets you into the water before the crowds.

Is the Riverside Walk wheelchair accessible?

The paved mile from the Temple of Sinawava is the most accessible thing in upper Zion Canyon, though it is not perfectly flat — it climbs about 60 feet and has some grade. It ends where the river begins, which is a genuinely good place to end.

Sleep at 8,400 Feet, Wade the Narrows Tomorrow

Duck Creek Village Inn is an hour and a half from the east entrance, and about twenty degrees cooler than the canyon floor when you get back.

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