Haley and I have been hiking Squaw a lot lately… as in five of the past six days. I’m planning on climbing Kings Peak next weekend, and I need to get my ass in gear. Squaw is a stroll through the park compared to Kings (ten times less distance and five times less elevation gain), but it’s right here in town, and I try to spice it up a little each time by taking steeper and more direct routes.
I’ve hiked Squaw many times, but only on Friday did I see the baby arch up on the cliffside for the first time. It’s so little that there is only a small window of opportunity to see the sky through it on the hike. For this reason, unless you happen to be looking up at that cliff during that minute-long window, it’s easy to miss.
Haley and I journeyed to the arch on Sunday, and to other equally excellent overlooks all the other times. You can look south over town, or north over the Grand Staircase, or east or west to more towering red rock cliffs. Squaw is nice. I dig it. Haley likes it too.
Last night, Molly and I took Haley and her new best friend Jeffrey for a hike in Angel Canyon. Jeffrey is a big, lovable mutt who doesn’t get in Haley’s face, and she loves that. They were a match made in heaven. She loves her kitty friends here at home, but you can tell she prefers quality dog time with laid-back dogs, especially if it’s during a hike. In fact, when Jeffrey had to go home, Haley whined from the car! But she will have plenty more doggy dates in the future, so she need not worry.
Molly brought along her camera, so all the following photos are by her (except the one of her, which I obviously took). And no, I don’t usually hike in dresses and flip-flops (though it has happened before), but we just came from an artist’s reception.
If you’ve noticed that I haven’t posted any hiking photos in over a month, it’s because I haven’t hiked in over a month - not since the epic 50-mile Paria adventure. There are many reasons for that, though primarily that that hike destroyed my best hiking shoes, and I’ve been too busy moving and settling into life as a cat lady. Of course, flat-out laziness does plays a role too. Well, no more! I needed to get away this weekend, bad. I took yesterday off to make up for a long work day last Saturday and planned to go somewhere, anywhere. Somewhere with a mountain to hike would be ideal. While I was doing so well with my hike mileage, I had yet to climb a mountain this year (and remember, I said I’d do at least five in five ranges). While going over my options, I settled on hiking Delano Peak. It seemed like an appropriate hike for both the dog and my lazy haven’t-hiked-in-a-month ass.
Delano Peak is the highest point in the Tushar Mountains, which is the third highest mountain range in Utah behind the Uintas and La Sal (take that Wasatch!). Delano, while not a rocky peak, reaches 12,173 feet. There is no trail up the mountain, which made it a little interesting, but it was pretty straight-forward. You could see a false summit just in front of it, so it was easy to tell where I was going. It was very steep though, and with no trail (and therefore no switchbacks), I was huffing and puffing. I had to resort to making my own switchbacks and stopping often to make it even remotely bearable. Altitude may have played a role in this. I haven’t hiked this high in I don’t even know when, and I was ridiculously sluggish from the very get-go… more so than not hiking in a month should make me. The dog kept me going though, and although it was quite miserable for me, it was well worth it when we finally reached the top. It was rather windy up there, which made it a little cool, but with temps around 100 in the valleys below, it was still pleasant. We didn’t stay on top for too long. I was looking forward to the hike down, because the hike up was so miserable, but as I should have known, going down will always be just as bad if not worse. And indeed it was. Oh well. We survived.
I’ve just returned from Paria Canyon, one of the world’s “premiere” backpacks. Only a few people are allowed into the canyon each day from any direction, and we had to book our permits over three months in advance (and even then we just barely got in). I’d been waiting day after day for the past three months to go by, and it was well-worth every day I waited. I knew it would be great, but it was so magnificent, so utterly breath-taking, and so much better than I ever imagined it would be.
There were critters everywhere, everything from tiny tadpoles to bighorn sheep. Out of sight, mountain lions lurked, and down below, enormous caterpillars crawled alongside our feet. The canyon walls towered so high above, some areas never even see sun. We spent our days walking in the water and our nights sleeping on sand under the stars. We winded through Buckskin Gulch, the longest slot canyon in the world, and ventured to one of the most remote and largest natural arches in the world too. We climbed over beaver dams and combed through reeds as thick as the South American jungle. And an epic ending to an epic hike, we came out of the canyon just as the Paria River collided with the mighty Colorado at the Grand Canyon. To call it great is an understatement. To call it amazing is too. It was so much more.
I saw my first rattlesnake ever today. I almost smooshed it with my car. It is probably a good thing that I know what they look like now. When I was five, my family and I camped just a few feet from a rattlesnake pit in the Badlands. Of course, we arrived at night and didn’t realize this until morning. Oops. Let’s hope I don’t make the same mistake sometime.
As I mentioned in the previous post, I took Friday off work to show Micah around Zion. Spent Thursday night camped out at some sort of hippie commune ranch thing. Woke up and hung around with hippie commune kitty.
Micah chillaxed on a hammock.
We visited the ghost town Grafton, got breakfast (not in Grafton), and headed up to the park. We saw a lizard. You know me and animals. I cannot pass up such photos, as repetitive as they get.
Then we voyaged up to Hidden Canyon… the trail I’ve meant hike to but never gotten around to. It was great.
Micah built a bunch of ridiculous cairns. It’s his thing.
Tired of the 90-degree weather, we headed to the Fairy Pools for some cooling off. It worked.
Underneath a waterfall there, was a bird’s nest. It was neat.
We met back up with Dave at the hippie commune, went to dinner, and went to bed. By 8 a.m. Saturday morning, I was on my way back home… why? Because I had to work. I may have gotten Friday off, but that didn’t save me from Saturday and Sunday shoots this weekend.
This week, Micah (half of my 80s prom date) headed south to my neck of the woods for the obligatory off-season trip south. I took Friday off work so I could show him around Zion. I headed there Thursday after work and we decided to hike Angels Landing at sunset. We started a little later than we would have liked to (the shuttle buses delayed our start time quite a bit), but we hit the trail around 7:30, when the sun was striking the east side of the canyon with glorious light. We knew it’d be dark on our way down, but as long as we were off the spine by dark, doing the rest of the hike in the dark was no big deal (we had our headlamps). The problem was getting back in time for the last shuttle.
We booked it up the trail, making it to the top in a record hour and five minutes (trust me, that’s fast). Here’s the view from a third of the way up.
Nearing the top, we peered over the edge to see if we could see Dave, the guy we were staying with, who was climbing the big wall route up Angels Landing. Camped out on his portaledge, he raised his PBR to us.
About five minutes from the top, I had to stop to get a photo of the light before it was gone. Good thing, because it was gone when we reached the top a few minutes later.
Micah soaking up the view.
We did not make it off the spine by dark, but the moonlight was strong enough that we were totally comfortable scrambling the last bit down in the dark. We were so comfortable in fact, that we hiked nearly the whole way down without our headlamps. We moved a little slower because of it, but it was well worth it. It wasn’t until the very end, when we were running to try to make the last shuttle, that I turned mine on so that the buses could possibly see us coming and wait for us (and also running on a trail in the dark seemed like an accident waiting to happen). Here is a 25-second exposure I made with the moonlight in Refrigerator Canyon.
We got back to the trailhead just after 10 and started walking down the middle of the road, hoping one last bus would come up behind us, and sure enough, it did… the sweeper bus that goes down just to make sure. We were happy. If we missed it, we would have had to walk over fives miles back or try to hitch a ride on a road that cars are not allowed on. So yeah, good thing we caught the bus.
And by the end of the night, I officially hit my 100 mile mark. Yee-haw!
This weekend, Miss Molly (henceforth referred to as Bitter Princess of the Forest) and I voyaged to the remote northwestern Kolob Canyons area of Zion. Originally planned as a long 14-mile day hike to the Kolob Arch, we instead opted to turn it into an overnight backpack to help us prep for our 40-mile backpack next month.
We were underway around noon on Saturday and returned 16 miles and 24 hours later. The main attraction was the Kolob Arch, the second-longest arch in the world, but it was so unimpressive that I’m not even including a photo here. Luckily, we stumbled upon a waterhole that made the entire hike well worth every single fly bite we endured (hundreds).
We had already set up camp and continued hiking (sans heavy backpacks) for a few miles when we stumbled on the swampy area. All of a sudden, strange noises started echoing in the air. At first I thought it was some sort of machinery, even though I found it hard to believe machinery could make its way that far into the backcountry. It must be some sort of weird bird mating call then, but no. We eventually realized that the incredibly loud noises were actually coming from the waterhole immediately to our left. Frogs. Dozens of them. I still can’t believe that loud of a noise can come from such a tiny animal, but there they were, singing their mating call in full glory. We spent about half an hour hanging out with these frogs, watching everything from a post-coital cuddle to a full-blown rape.
We hiked back out early to avoid the high, mid-day temperatures, but we still got a whiff of it. The last leg of the hike is, of course, the hardest part… a steep, mile-long uphill. Combined with a big-ass backpack and a full-on assault by an army of flies, I think it’s safe to say I wanted to kill myself (well, really just those damn flies). But well, considering I escaped the trip with nothing more than bug bites and calves only a little tight, I’d say it was a very good trip. As always, photos…
That’s me. I found out tonight that I made the front page of the outdoors section of the southern Utah newspaper! My name is no stranger to print, but it is a rare occasion when a photo of me, not by me, makes its way in.
It is days like today that I fully appreciate the act of sitting. I hurt. I went to yoga yesterday after not going in over a month, and now I hurt. My abs and hamstrings have been ripped in half. Though I may ache the good hurt right now, I was feeling limber right after class yesterday and decided I’d do a small hike in Zion. Well, it started as a small hike at least…
I figured I’d head up to Hidden Canyon. I hear it’s great, and I’ve never been. I slugged straight up the Weeping Rock switchbacks for a grueling mile in full sun, and when I got to the turn-off to go to Hidden Canyon, I saw so many people that there was no way I was going in there. I decided I’d continue on the trail to Observation Point instead, but turn around once I got to Echo Canyon. It’d be a nice resting spot, and a good turn-around for a quick (albeit steep and ass-kicking) hike. But when I arrived at Echo Canyon, I found a group of Europeans hogging the place. So I kept going for a while… and a while more… and a little more after that. And well, by the time I was ready to turn around, I figured I might as well go all the way to the top… to Observation Point. I’m not quite sure why I decided this… I wasn’t even half-way up, but well, I did it. I didn’t have nearly enough energy to make the hike at all enjoyable on the way up, but as the clouds started to roll over, the wind picked up, and after eating some of my Clif Bar, it got a little easier… still slow, but easier. I got to the top, and finally, four and something hours later, back to the trailhead where I basked in the awesomeness that is sitting.
Grueling and exhausting as it was, some good came from my ridiculously active day. 1. I was so stretched out from yoga that I’m not sore from the hike at all, only from those ab-busting and hamstring-ripping yoga poses. This made it possible to be at least semi-functional (though still lazy) today. 2. It was incredibly refreshing to do a stormy-weather hike, even if it never rained on me (though I did feel an occasional drop). And 3. I added another eight miles to my YTD hike mileage when I only planned on adding about three.
For those who don’t know, my goal is to hike at least 300 miles this year and bag peaks in at least five different mountain ranges. I’m currently at 79 miles (not too shabby for only two months of hiking) and zero peaks (but I got tentative plans to do the first next weekend in the Pine Valley Mountains). Having goals like this is a good excuse to make sure I get out. I hope to actually do a lot more miles and peaks than the goal requires, but I wanted a reasonable goal that I can actually attain, without being too easy (hence the five different ranges, not simply five peaks).
Anyway, here are some photos from yesterday’s eight-mile addition…
view from the top… and yes, I know it’s nearly identical to a photo I posted back in March, but well, I lack originality… so sue me
Echo Canyon
Indian paintbrush is everywhere right now.
yours truly at the top
a peaceful Echo Canyon, sans loud European hiking group
there are bajillions of different kinds of flowers growing out of the rocks right now, but I thought this one was especially pretty
I live in the middle of nowhere. I love it, and tend to think of it as the middle of everywhere, but by city-slicker standards, I live in the middle of nowhere. I live in the Grand Staircase. For those who don’t know, the Grand Staircase is a massive piece of land (part of a 1.9 million-acre national monument) here in southern Utah. As its name implies, it is like a giant staircase, stretching from the Grand Canyon just south of me, to Bryce Canyon, just north of me (this drawing may help you understand). I live along the second step, the Vermilion Cliffs, and work along the third step, the White Cliffs.
To get my kicks during the work-week, I hike the trail in town that winds up the side of the 1,000-foot Vermilion Cliffs and spits me out on top looking north to the White Cliffs. It’s a glorious sight anytime, but I discovered on Tuesday that it’s best at sunrise. I went back on Thursday and brought my camera.
This weekend, Miss Molly and I, along with Garrett (the mudslinger from last weekend), ventured to Bryce Canyon to hike the 8.5-mile Fairyland Loop. Molly and I have been meaning to do this trail for a while, but the high elevation there kept the place snowy and muddy until recently. There was minimal mud along our journey, but what ass-painery we lacked in mud was made up for in wind… super gusty, nearly 40 mph winds. Sometimes it felt really good, but most of the time it was just a pain in the ass.
Bryce is beautiful, but I’m not sure I’ll go there too often. It seems like the kind of place that if you’ve seen it once, you’ve seen it all. Regardless, it was a welcomed new sight, and I even got to hug a hoodoo… but I think I’ll stick to Zion as my primary source of entertainment.
And to continue with the new video aspect of this here site, here is me on my quest to hug a hoodoo.
And here’s a little clip I threw together of me snarfing on our post-hike meal… really disgusting pizza (but hell, after 8.5 miles, any pizza will suffice).
With Whitney’s bike race in Hurricane this weekend, we decided to camp out in Zion after the race rather than heading back to my neck of the woods. She was so exhausted after the 25-mile race that hiking was not really an option, so we camped on the same sandy shores that I got stuck in six months ago.
We spent the bulk of our evening watching the ants that inhabited our campsite. No, really, for like two hours, we sat and watched these ants. We fed them bits of sour apple blowpop and a whole peanut M&M. We watched as they first discovered the delicious taste, then as they figured out a plan for getting the giant candy bits down their little ant hole. They got the sucker bit and half the M&M down before Whitney accidentally trampled their domain and caved in their precious tunnel. In the morning, the ones that were trapped outside were dead.
In a crazy twist of events, I ran into an old college friend, Ryan, at Whit’s bike race. He, a writer, was covering the event. We’ve both lived in Utah now for a couple years, yet only gotten lunch once back in 2006. It was great to see him, and worked out perfectly because I was camping in Zion that night and he was hiking there the next day. So Sunday morning, a still-exhausted Whitney headed back to Park City and I hiked Angel’s Landing with Ryan and some of his friends. Ryan wore old-man Utah socks. His excuse is that “they wick the moisture away!” but that’s really no excuse.
Garrett, a fellow photographer, took most of the pictures (which you can check out on his blog), but I managed to fire off a few too. Here he is trying to destroy my camera gear with mud.
Since it’s a common occurrence, this is probably my 10 millionth photo of the moon over Zion, but whatev. It’s still pretty.
And here is Garrett trying to ford the river, and nearly (but unfortunately not) falling.
