4/9/10 KINGS CANYON

We woke to a fairly cool morning but reasonably clear skies. We decided to do the Kings Canyon Rim Walk which is a 3.5 to 4 hr walk with part of it at the beginning stated to be ‘steep’ but the rest of the walk was supposed to be ‘moderate’. It is approximately 6km.


Royce and I headed into the Resort so I could get on the internet to check what was happening with an eBay transaction and to give Rory a call. We then met up with Raymond and Hazel at Kings Canyon and the 4 of us headed off.

The first part of the walk is certainly STEEP! It is almost a vertical climb for 500 metres. It felt a lot more than 500m but a ranger had advised Royce (when he was getting fuel in the Resort this morning) to ensure we took it slowly and plenty of rests on the way, which is what we did.

Once that first climb is out of the way the rest is over very rocky terrain and you have to watch where you put your feet all the time. We continued to climb for quite a long time but the climb was more gradual and relatively easy (particularly in comparison with the first 500m).

The scenery was spectacular and I wouldn’t have missed it for the world – even though I did get very close to a panic attack on the first part of the climb (because of the steepness and the narrow track right on the edge of the cliff face).

We did the walk in about 4.45 hrs but that included a detour to the Garden of Eden so all up our time was pretty good. We didn’t see too many other ‘oldies’ doing the walk. Most of the people doing this walk were at least half our age. We all felt very tired at the end and my legs were getting a bit wobbly near the end, but we did it!

The Ranger Royce spoke to while getting fuel this morning told him there was a waterfall at the Garden of Eden (which is part of Kings Canyon) and we would be very fortunate to see it – apparently only about 500 people have ever seen the waterfall in Kings Canyon. Unfortunately it appears to have dried up by the time we got there so we missed out on that, but that is only a very small disappointment in that the whole Kings Canyon is magnificent – even without a waterfall.