Wandering around the East Side

One of my favorite things to do in the winter time is to wander around the East Side. I parked at one of the familiar pull offs and headed into Clear Creek, then up a small drainage. I found a drainage that I thought I had never explored and decided to go explore it. When I started hiking, though, I realized that it just led to another drainage that I had previously explored. This was my quick way into a viewpoint of Parunaweap. It was one of the least exposed section of rock, but with great views along the way.
There were moqui marbles and rocks with circular patterns built in.

This place is still relatively unexplored by the 3 million visitors that tromp the trails of Zion yearly, so they have not stolen all of the interesting parts of this
I could see my route through the Root Canals that Seth and I had taken. We went up the canyon on the left and down the one on the right through Many Pools. A pretty fun trip, but super challenging and brushy.
After climbing up some steep slick rock, it eventually dumped me out on a flat vegetated plateau. From here, many different expeditions to various places could be undertaken.
 I initially started out on a small trip after finding a path that had been made in the sand. It had been made by a snake. I followed it over to a pile of dirt and realized that if I decided to dig that pile of dirt up, I might find myself a large rattlesnake inside. So I decided to leave it alone. Instead, I headed east and stayed near the protruding peaks. I decided that maybe it would be fun to try to climb one of the Triplets that were right there. I was not overly ambitious about it since I was just kind of in a wandering kind of mood. As I climbed up there were interesting slick rock formations and great views of Zion Canyon below.

I got to a saddle between the two peaks and tried to find a safe way to the top. None of it seemed like I would die if I fell, but all of it seemed like there was high potential for injury. Out here, by myself, I could not take any risks. So only a few feet from the top, I decided to turn around.
I had amazing views in every direction of the Parunaweap area and the east side also. I took lots of pictures and got distracted for a bit then continued on down.

 I had to figure out where to go next. I wandered around on the flat plateau until I got on the other side of the Triplets. I found myself separated from continuing east by a large canyon. Instead, I found a nice spot to sit down and have lunch. I looked up and could see Nippletop and the Triplets separated by this canyon.

 In fact, Nippletop actually had people on top. I decided that I would come back. (I actually tried a week later to climb Nippletop with a friend, but we did not make it as he was uncomfortable with the exposure. No blog because my camera ran out of battery.) I decided to go check out this canyon. I stayed close to the high point I was at and traversed over. I found an unused route into the canyon and was nearly immediately turned back by a drop-off. I am sure that this is an unexplored Zion slot canyon, but I don't think that I have a strong desire to make a first descent.

 It looked rather brushy, though there are probably a large supply of good anchors. I ended up popping out of the canyon back onto a flat plateau behind the Triplets once again. Picking a different way to explore and being intentionally vague so that no one can follow my route, I found myself once again in a place that I had been. I looked around and found a panel of pictographs along a wall.
 This was an excellent spot as it provided shade during the summer and full sun during the winter.

I even found a bit of pottery on the ground near the pictographs. I left here returning by my original route to get back to the car having had a day without too many new discoveries, but nonetheless, enjoyable on the east side of Zion National Park