Last year, I saw a video of someone kayaking in a cave with emerald green waters. The captions said that this location was only a 45-minute drive from Vegas. I was completely taken with the scenery and decided I would one day find my way to this stunning cave. Fast forward a year and I have my flight to Las Vegas booked and a plan in place. The video below isn't the one that I saw, but gives the same effect.

Avoiding the Pricey Tourist Trap

When I followed the Instagram link for the ad, it brought me to a company’s website that arranged guided kayak tours for tourists... very expensive tours. A single day guided tour in Black Canyon cost $199 USD per person at Desert Adventures. Plus, you would be limited by the size of the group, speed of the kayakers, and the plan of the guide. This is a good option for people who aren’t confident in their kayaking skills, but Chris and I prefer to go at our own pace and stop where we feel like stopping, so we ended up arranging our on kayak rental at Willow Creek Marina. We rented a 2-person kayak for a day, which cost only $120 for the day for the two of us, to paddle portion of the Black Canyon Water Trail travelling North from Willow Beach.

Our Kayak Trip Plan Up Black Canyon

Our original plan was to kayak for 8am until 4pm when the kayak was due back, travelling upriver to see the various sights to be seen, including the beautiful, well-advertised Emerald Cave. When arranging our rental, the woman at the desk said the best time to experience the cave was around midday when the high sun shines straight down, illuminating the cave’s clear green waters. Since we were launching early, and the cave was only about 30-45 minutes upriver, we figured we would kayak up as far as we could go until we had to turn around to make it back to the cave by midday (and hopefully before the tour groups make it there).

Even the Best Laid Plans Require Flexibility

We decided to push hard to make the best progress we could. We moved pretty quickly too once we found our paddling rhythm (it was our first time using a tandem kayak together). After a couple of hours though, we found that our relative arm lengths and the strokes we had to adopt to be able to paddle in tandem was harder on the shoulders for me and on the biceps for Chris than usual. We also found that we had to stop and get out of the kayak more times than usual to pee out all the extra fluids we were drinking due to the exertion and the desert heat.

We decided to turn around at Dragon’s Back Ridge at around 11:15 to make sure we had enough time to get to the cave by around 12:30, figuring we would make good progress and travel faster going downriver. We estimated correctly, and just in time to beat several tour groups to Emerald Cave, who chose to stop there on the way out rather than back. The tour group arriving after us, politely let us experience the cave without rushing us. As we left, we saw 2 other groups coming in after them. Our timing was perfect, and after another 45 minutes or so we were back at the marina after 4½ hours of kayaking, at which point we were done after all the awkward tandem kayaking.

Sights Seen in Black Canyon

Even in our half-day of kayaking, we got to see a lot of beauty in the canyon. We saw the old gauging station, cable car and catwalk used to monitor the river before Hoover Dam was built. We had planned to stop and walk up the short path to the river gauger residence site on the way back to the marina but there was a huge tour group already there so we decided to pass. We made it out as far as the mountainous volcanic rock formation called Dragon’s Back Ridge, because that’s what it resembles (cue Game of Thrones theme song).

The famous Emerald Cave was pretty, but much smaller than it looked in the video footage I saw on Instagram. At first I thought, “This can’t be it,” as we entered, but as we looked outward from within the cave, I could see its namesake, the emerald green hues of the water that only came to light at that time of day. It was pretty, albeit a short experience. It’s a good thing that wasn’t the most impressive part of the trip.

The best part was simply experiencing the canyon from the lowest vantage point, the river, and being able to glide up and down the Colorado River appreciating the grandness of the canyon formations all around us. That was the main part of what made the trip so memorable.

Paddling Downriver from Hoover Dam - The Better Way to Go

This would have been the best way to see as much of Black Canyon as possible. Having the advantage of travelling downriver would have allowed us to see more things with less effort. The trouble was there are only limited launch permits (which costs $22-27 per canoe or kayak) from Hoover Dam and it was all booked up the day we wanted to go. There are hikes with natural hot springs, petroglyphs and waterfalls that we missed further upriver. So if you want the whole Black Canyon experience in a day, or at least a greater part of it, without having to go with a tour group, make sure you book your permit and boat rentals with one of the companies that offers shuttle pick-up well ahead of time, like Desert Adventures.

We decided we would make up for the missed hot springs by hiking Gold Strike Canyon the next day (more on that in tomorrow’s blog post).

Have you ever kayaked or canoed in at Black Canyon, Arizona? How was your experience? Please share your thoughts in the comments.