Fat Man’s Misery (West Fork)

Zion National Park, UT Zion Area

Trip stats

Distance
9.4 mi
Net Gain
2,100 ft
Time
7-10 hrs
YDS Rating
Class 3
ACA Rating
3B
Longest Rappel
50 ft
Route
Loop

Ratings out of 10

Effort
5.2/10
Personality
8/10
Beauty
8/10
Solitude
6.3/10
What do these mean? →

Route map + Trailhead

Trailhead Coordinates

37.225910, -112.887651

The directions link below drops a pin on the trailhead coordinates and lets Google Maps pick the route. If the drive has rough roads or access issues that GPS nav might get wrong, I cover that in my trip report.

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Trip report

Technical canyon warning

This is a technical canyon requiring canyoneering skills and specialized equipment. If you are not experienced with building anchors or using the gear required for technical canyoneering, do not attempt this route.

Oct 8, 2017 — Earlier this year, I did Fat Man's Misery (East Fork), an incredibly fun day. It turned out to be a little more work for slightly less pretty narrows than this trip report, the West Fork. I've wanted to check out this fork ever since we did the other one, and I'm really glad I did. Anyway, you really can't go wrong with either fork, but I might recomend this one over the East Fork due its shorter approach.

Head through the canyon to the west of Checkerboard Mesa to a notch at the top of a sandy slope, and descend into the Zion backcountry ahead. Follow cairns on a decently well-traveled social trail to the head of the West Fork of Fat Man's Misery. The trail regularly crosses slickrock, so you may need to keep your eyes peeled for cairns. Find an easy route down into the West Fork and you can't get lost from there. Once you reach the beautiful grotto before entering The Barracks (a section in Parunuweap Canyon), the rappeling is over and you can follow the East Fork of the Virgin River west for a short time before looking for a Class 3 scramble to escape The Barracks.

Above the Barracks, we were at the southern reaches of a wide ridge, which would eventually lead to the slickrock wonderland that we left to drop into the canyon earlier. We followed a good social trail supported by cairns that lead along some slickrock for a bit, then the trail continues traversing on sandy terrain. Paralleling Fat Man's Misery, the trail is in great shape for a time, but it fades away a bit and gets tricky to follow. Eventually after traversing pretty far away from the wide ridge, the faint trail finally ascends to the left and up to the wide ridge. It's likely we could have continued directly north along this wide ridge straight from the Barracks rather than do the bench traverse, but the more prominent social trail leading out of the Barracks  tooks us this way. Once on the ridge, we managed to stick to a slightly better social trail as it continues north and merges with the aproach route from earlier in the day.

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Photos

73 photos

  1. After leaving the road and entering the canyon separating Checkerboard Mesa from Crazy Quilt Mesa.
  2. Heading up the sandy canyon, a social trail helps to avoiding some minor obstacles.
  4. View back from the saddle before descending into the backcountry.
  5. A fairly obvious trail leads to the West Fork of Misery Canyon. this is a view back as we head through the desert.
  6. Plenty of slickrock mixed in, cairns helping us keep to the route.
  7. Another shot back along the social trail.
  8. The slickrock ridge ahead is where we'll be returning later on the canyon exit.
  9. Ascending the slickrock before a final descent into the West Fork.
  10. View back as we ascend the final slickrock ridge.
  11. Heading down into the West Fork of Misery Canyon.
  12. Some cute potholes at the head of the canyon.
  15. First rappel.
  16. View back at the first rappel.
  17. Looking up at some debris stuck in the slot.
  19. Beautiful narrows.
  22. A shot of me on a tricky down-climb.
  23. The canyon opens up occasionally. Here we are going back into a short section of narrows.
  27. Natural arch within a section of the narrows.
  28. A rappel or handline goes directly next to the arch, really beautiful.
  29. Not a flattering shot of Mike and Scot, but I liked the photo so there.
  30. Scot goofing off as usual.
  35. A fun slide into some water.
  36. Approaching the confluence with Fat Man's Misery (East Fork) seen on the left.
  37. After a rappel from a tree, followed by some short narrows, we had a final short rappel to get into the East Fork. This is a view back up at that last rappel, about 40 feet from a tree.
  38. Continuing down the canyon past the confluence. It only gets more interesting from here.
  45. The double arch that hovers over a full swimmer.
  46. Looking back at the double arch.
  49. Mini down climb into a warm spring.
  51. Swimming through the warm spring.
  52. Exiting Misery Canyon and entering The Barracks (Parunuweap Canyon).
  53. Looking back toward Misery Canyon's mouth.
  54. Heading through the Barracks.
  60. Don't miss the exit scramble on the right.
  61. Class 3 scramble out of the Barracks.
  62. Last bit of Class 3. Photos from here on are from another trip through Fat Man's Misery.
  63. Above the Class 3 scrambling. A social trail leads across the slickrock on the left. It's likely you could just ascend high yo the top of the ridge on the left, but we chose to take the trail.
  64. View back across the slickrock. We came from the right in this photo.
  65. Trail traverses along a sloped bench for a while.
  66. View back toward the bench traverse.
  67. Cairns help mark the way, but following the trail can get tricky here.
  68. Trail begins to thin a bit, but begins ascending toward the ridge above.
  69. The ridge seen above, but slickrock makes following the trail more difficult.
  70. After reaching the ridge above, we continued on a better social trail leading north.
  71. Through some cute sandstone formation.
  72. The hump seen center is where we dropped into Fat Man's Misery earlier. The trail heads toward it and gets lost on the slickrock, so we navigated to the main approach trail.
  73. View back along the slickrock a bit before reaching the approach trail, which we took back.

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GPX track

Fat Man’s Misery (West Fork) GPX route and driving track

The complete GPX track is available to download, so you can load the route straight into your navigation app or device. The trip report, route info, photos and planning details stay free.

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