Rappelling, Jumping, swimming and hiking
My college friend Jayson Owens was in town for a work trip, and we were planning on hanging out. We’ve only seen each other once in the last 20-ish years, but got along like it was yesterday.
Chris Jain had a permit for Eaton canyon and was looking for folks to do it with. My mind hatched a plan.
Jayson’s flight home was at 5:30 pm, from LAX. Eaton Canyon is only about 15 minutes from my house, but Jayson was staying in Santa Monica. Then the canyon is almost 9 miles round trip, much of it slow. I was doing the math on whether it could work, and it was tight but I thought it could.
Saturday I got up at 3:45 am, packed some last minute things, and drove to Santa Monica to pick up Jayson. We went straight to the trail head, arriving around 6, met Chris, and got ready. Started hiking around 6:20. It’s a fairly long steep hike up the Henniger Flats, but on a dirt road and not-technical.
We talked about politics and investing mostly. And women a little.
After Henniger, you’re soon onto a faint path, poorly maintained, that drops you into the canyon. We stopped briefly, put on our harnesses, and started down the canyon. Super fun. There are several long rappels, some pools that you have to swim through, some slides down rock, and, my favorite, some jumping.
The water levels were very, very low. But it was still fun, and it;s a unique little canyon, high on wilderness for being so close to one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world. It’s amusing when you get to the last rappel (a waterfall easily approached from below, and a VERY popular hiking destination. ) After hours of seeing no one but ourselves, we had to shout down and ask folks to give us room to drop our ropes, and rappelled down into a crowd. A weird reentry.
Some good wildlife too. We saw deer, frogs, tadpoles, surprisingly big fish, salamander, and a rattle snake.
Super fun day out with two good men. It took us just about 8 hours from car to car, moving pretty much non-stop (we took two short breaks). Got to the car, drove to my house. Quick showers and back in the car to get Jayson to LAX. Dropped him off at 4:15. Perfect.
Not a lot of videos or photos. Weird light in the canyon and water drops on the lens meant most of what I shot was useless.
