Rattlesnake Canyon 3BVI, Grand Canyon National Park

A 4:30am rise — the darkness still clouds my introspection. Weather reports showed higher integers than zero just to the right of the decimal. Rain was on its way. We hiked up Jumpup Canyon from the Kanab Creek junction as our approach. The blue hour threw colors of violet onto the redwall like a changing lens filter cycling through pigments of magenta.

The canyon was beautiful — 6-8 rappels through very interesting sections of narrow redwall. We also attempted a sneak route from Rattlesnake to Kirk's Chasm: Pat hiked up a break before the last rap and found we could gain the top of the redwall. We hard-fixed a line but threatening weather halted the plan. Looking forward to completing that sneak route to Kirk's Chasm next season.