Grand Canyon & Moab 2007

The plan for this trip began when Caleb and I stopped at Moab, Utah for a short time in ‘06. I really enjoyed the place and wanted to go back and spend more time there. Jonny wanted to hike Grand Canyon and also see Moab. We talked about it some but didn’t make any definite plans. Then Mike said he’d be interested in going along.

So with three people to split costs, we started making plans for real. In the meantime my grandparent’s 50^th anniversary was being planned in Kansas, and all the grandkids were supposed to attend. I tried to find a way to combine both trips, but it was hard because of the timing; I had to be back to work about the same time as the anniversary. Eventually everything fell into place for us to leave on Saturday morning, March 3.

A week before we left for Grand Canyon, we all went to Rockville, MD to do some shopping for gear and food. Jonny and I got some climbing gear for Moab and food for Grand Canyon. I wanted to take nothing extra into Grand Canyon and planned for my menu and minimal survival gear; everything else stayed home- a decision I was soon glad I made.

On Saturday, March 3, we left Pennsylvania at 5 in the morning. We had a fairly uneventful drive to Springfield, MO for night. There we stayed at a Red Roof Inn. The next day for lunch we stopped in Amarillo, TX for some good Mexican food at Ruby Tequila’s. We reached Albuquerque a little after dark and drove up to the top of the hill on I-40 to look at town. We stayed at a nice Days Inn on the west side.

On Monday we drove to Williams, AZ where we stopped for gas, then on to Grand Canyon. We arrive at the gate around 2:30pm and went to the General Store in the park where Mike rented some hiking poles. We spent some time behind the Bright angel Lodge admiring the view, and then picked up our lodging tickets for the Phantom Ranch. We had reservations for bunks in the men’s dorm there. We then left the park and went to the Grand Canyon Visitor’s Center & Imax Theater in time to watch the movie. The next stop was the Pine Country Restaurant in Williams for some home cooking. Williams is very quiet, especially after sunset. There is a general store, a few motels and gas stations, and several restaurants. Other than the railroad, there is really nothing that is worth driving out of the way –let alone 1500 miles, to see. There is a railroad running through town, but what town does not have one of those. I never thought railroads were just terribly entertaining, anyway. We walked around town after dinner, but the cafés all closed at sundown so we went back to the motel and started to pack for the big hike. There was a lot of scurrying around the crowded room, and stuffing and restuffing in the effort to leave every extra ounce and cubic inch out of the pack. We even did a practice hike along the railroad tracks under the stars. Back at the motel, we lined up our packs and set the alarm clock for 4:30am.

In the morning, we jumped out of bed in the morning and filled our packs with water. Then we went to Denny’s for breakfast. We didn’t have any problem with morning traffic in Williams. As it was, everything was dark and asleep, and we drove past the Denny’s several times just trying to find the driveway. (And we thought we could hike the Grand Canyon.) I think it was the only place open in town. The staff there was trying hard to stay awake themselves. Then they wouldn’t accept my credit card for payment because my signature didn’t match my driver’s license. Imagine two sleepy people arguing over signatures. I couldn’t convince them that I was legitimate, so I went out to the car and found another card. I felt like just driving away. They probably couldn’t believe that people would actually get up this early in the morning, or maybe we looked like convicts, or something. Anyway, we had a bus to catch; so we drove to the Bright Angel Lodge for the Hiker’s Express Bus to the South Kaibab Trailhead. The bus was on time at 7:30am. We started down the trail at 8:30. It was a very nice day with a few clouds to shade us from direct sun. We had a good 8 mile hike down to Phantom Ranch. The primitive beauty of the canyon was refreshing after more than two days in the car. We reached the Phantom Ranch at 11 and heated some water for the freeze dried meals we had along. Cooking was not permitted on the grounds of the ‘Ranch, so we weren’t sure just how we were going to make lunch. We scouted around awhile and finally chose a secluded picnic table to rest and snack. After all, we were not really cooking, just heating some water on a stove. According to the guidebook I had bought on the rim, Ribbon Falls was only a 12 mile-RT hike. So we decided to hike over there and look at that, yet. We started hiking quite optimistically and soon had many miles behind us. Walking through the box canyon above Phantom Ranch for several miles was very spectacular. This is a very narrow canyon, only wide enough for the trail and Bright Angel Creek, with towering walls overhead. The trail stays in this canyon for about 4 miles. After this box canyon the canyon widened to a narrow desert valley with lots of cactus and yucca growing in the sand. The temperature was quite hot by now, probably above 80.

We saw the falls in the distance and made our way thru the brush to the bottom of the falls. Ribbon Falls is a 100’ high waterfall on a small stream. This stream falls out of the canyon wall above and drops down on a high travertine formation that’s covered with thick moss. The water sprays out into the air and seeps thru the moss to drip out the bottom. The temperature is quite a bit cooler near the falls because of the spray. We stretched out here, dried our socks, and ate more Clif bars. We were almost out of drinking water. We started back and I kept walking without stopping for five miles. Then my legs were so stiff and refusing to move that I decided I had nothing to lose by running. I shuffled down the trail this way for a while. My legs were sometimes numb, and sometimes had sharp pain. I found out later that my muscle was probably separating from the bone in my leg; this took me six weeks to fully recover from. I finally reached camp again and got two Snickers bars and some energy drink from my stash for a recovery meal. I walked another half mile to the Bright Angel Campground to meet my friend Wes who was with a group of hikers from Kansas. I didn’t find him in the campground and decided to walk out to the river. When I reached a sign that said “Rock fall area, walk quickly”, I thought better of walking further and sat down by the creek and worked on recovery some more. I walked back to the Canteen and found Mike and Jonny. We decided to go to Wes’s camp to cook our supper as we were not permitted to cook at the dorm. We walked over there and found a few people around camp. We spent a pleasant time there enjoying an awesome canyon evening. We cooked supper with them and hung around till dark. It was fun being with you: Wes, Jaylon, Tony, Carl, Shane, Carissa, Nathan, and Sharlene. We were staying in a men’s dorm with ten bunks, a shower, and a bathroom. It was nice to have a hot shower before bed. Every bed was full. The dorm was quiet and everybody seemed to try extra hard to be agreeable in these small quarters. I slept very well.

The next morning we got up and soon found our sore legs again. We had to be checked out of the dorm by 7:30am. We packed as quickly as possible then started the trek out of the middle of the earth. The Bright Angel Trail follows the river for several miles of hope raising , and then dashing, elevations. The trail gets higher and higher above the river and then plunges all the way to the river again. After repeating this several times we reached the turnoff to the rim. Then we started climbing for real, beside a tiny creek following a groove in the rock. The trail climbs up and finally comes out the top of this tiny canyon. Here is where the switchbacks begin and from here we can see the trail switch back and forth until it disappears in the distance. The rim far above is not the south rim but only the rim of Plateau Point, half way to the top.

There is nothing to do but keep putting one foot in front of the other, so I keep doing it. My legs feel like two stumps, and I’m quite happy and surprised that they still function at all. I do not really want to fly in a helicopter now. I try not to look up at the cliffs thousands of feet high I have yet to ascend. I can’t even see the top. At the top of these switchbacks the trail winds through another small canyon with a creek and lots of waterfalls. The scenery is real and beautiful but I dare not stop often. I have miles and miles to go before sundown. I have enough food for today only. I stop to change socks and fix a hotspot on my foot. A blister here would mean disaster. Finally we climb out of that layer of rock and we’re on top of the plateau. I can see Indian Gardens in the distance where we will stop for lunch and water. Indian Gardens is the half way point for mileage, one third of the way for elevation. We’ve walked nearly six miles and climbed 1500 feet. We have a little less than six miles and 3000 vertical feet left to go. We put on sandals and spread our shoes and socks out in the sun to dry while we fix lunch of granola, Clif bars, snickers, dried fruit, energy gel, electrolyte drink, and hot chocolate. One hour and 9000 calories stronger, we hit the trail again. I try to conserve my energy by not starting too fast. It is important to me that I make the rim. Now we will climb switchbacks for real. The next 5 miles is practically all switchbacks up a drainage area between cliffs. Looking up now is like watching ‘ants’ that are crawling back and forth across the cliffs. Below I can see miles of trail winding back and forth, down and down. I keep putting my behind foot in front of my ahead foot and in this manner finally reach and pass the rest houses that signal the start of ‘tourist’ area. There are lots of people walking on the trail here and speaking all languages and wearing an interesting variety of foot wear. The lower a person gets in the canyon, the more standard the clothing becomes. The closer to the top, the flimsier the shoes are.

I wonder how many photos have ever been taken of Grand Canyon. How many people have fallen off the edge of these trails? Is it more painful to hike or ride a mule? These thoughts will come to you too, and more as you are ascending the trail, coming back into civilization after a short but strenuous journey to the middle of the earth. I am asked simple questions by well-meaning citizens who exclaim over how far away the river is, and when they find out that people can actually go there. Everybody will have a bottle of water and a camera. When these things came to pass, I knew I had to be close to the top. I had almost made it. I gladly stepped off the trail to let a mule train pass. Hikers are to stand quietly to the inside edge of the trail and give mules preference. This makes a very convenient rest stop. Finally we reached the very top and put our sandals on and watched the ground squirrels playing on the rim. It was 2:30pm. I was glad to be done. Somehow it didn’t seem that bad, now that we were done.

We left the park, determined to stop at the first restaurant we found. We drove for four hours through Navajo country with nothing but the occasional hut. Finally we found a steakhouse in Blanding, Utah and stopped in. They were a very small restaurant in a remote town, but served us some big steaks. The next stop was the Lazy Lizard Hostel in Moab.

I had never stayed at a hostel before and was curious about the kind of experience I would have. We drove up to the place and found it tucked away behind a mini storage business. The office was in the basement of the house so I went in to see what I could find. I found a bunch of people lounging in the basement and a man sleeping behind a desk with his feet on the top of it. He woke up and I asked him where we were to sleep. He got up then and showed us to our little log cabin in the yard. The cabin was just big enough for four bunks, an armchair, and a little electric heater. There was one window and one door. Two picnic tables were outside the door under a shade tree. He showed us where the hot tub building was -and the showers, and said we could use the kitchen that was stocked with dishes in the house anytime. We could keep our food in the refrigerator and freezer, and were not to use anybody else’s food. We promptly showered and went to bed.

The next morning I walked over to the main house to check it out a little more. There were probably ten men in the crowded kitchen using the stoves to cook eggs, and slicing up piles of fresh fruit on the counter. The air was blue with burnt food smoke and the whole place reeked. We decided to find a restaurant. The Pancake Haus was the place we picked this morning. After breakfast we did some recovery at the cabin. While we relaxed under the trees there, the neighbor was cleaning out his apartment. He said he had just moved in and his place really was a mess. He had a little burro pull camper covered with bumper stickers backed up to a courtyard made of old boards and bicycle parts. This area was his living room and he had some old car seats setting around with a TV in one corner. A few boards and some kind of old net flopping over head provided shade. There were tents set up here and there around the hostel in open spaces. Old bike parts were scattered in the corners. It was a quiet place to spend the day. The weather was perfect for lazing around under the trees outside the cabin. We went to the grocery store and bought some hamburgers to grill for supper. Then we drove around in Arches National Park and went to Potash Road to the Wall Street climbing area. Jonny retrieved the gear I had to leave high on the rock in ‘06 with Caleb. We fired up the grilles at the hostel and had a fine meal out on the patio. I ended a perfect day with an Americano at the Mondo Café.

Woke up to another beautiful day then ate breakfast at the Moab Diner. We decided to climb Owl Rock in Arches National Park. Owl Rock is a narrow rock tower that is a little over 100 feet high. We had a good climb and all reached the top. There was only room for one at a time on the top, and the view was really great. We climbed it several times then drove around checking out bike shops. We went to a good Mexican restaurant for supper.

Today we think our legs have returned to normal, so we decided to rent mountain bikes. Chile Pepper Bike Shop had very nice bikes for a good price so we got bikes from them. There are lots of bike shops in town and we haven’t visited them all. We rode the Slickrock Trail in the Sand Flats Rec Area. That was a lot of fun and up and down on slickrock. The trail is 13 miles long with the practice loop. Then we went to Subway for lunch and Jonny and Mike went back to the cabin. I took the car and went back Kane Creek Canyon a couple of miles. Kane Creek Canyon is a narrow canyon with a creek in it. The road back there gets rough and follows some pretty narrow ledges with huge drops offs at the edge of the road. I went back as far as I could with the car, then unloaded the bike and rode another mile or so to Ice Cream Parlor. Ice Cream Parlor is a famous climbing area and there were lots of climbers around, some high on the walls. This area is also popular with mountain bikers riding the Amasa Back area and I saw lots of them. We had another barbecue at the house.

We ate breakfast at the Jailhouse Café Sunday morning. This was the best breakfast yet. I had a whole grain waffle piled high with all kinds of fresh fruit. We loaded up our hiking and climbing gear and headed to South Sixshooter in Indian Creek 60 miles away. Our directions told us to open a gate and drive in a dirt road. The road quickly turned to a 4wd only trail so we parked the car and walked the 4 miles to the base of S Sixshooter. We decided to take what appeared to be a shortcut up to the top of a plateau that was several hundred feet high. We climbed up to a ledge about half way up and then traversed over to the other side, only to discover we had climbed the wrong plateau. Now we were on the opposite side we had come up on and we hoped we would be able to find a place to descend through the cliffs on the rim. We explored around awhile and made it safely down. But our real summit seemed just as far off as at first. We pushed ahead toward the only area in the next plateau we thought had a slight chance of us climbing it. The rim was far above us and blocked with high cliffs along the top. The scale of these walls was deceptive and made the fifty foot high cliffs at the top look like something we could crawl over. We found a Jeep parked at the bottom of this wash and followed footprints as far up as we could. Close to the top we lost the tracks and tried to find a way through the cliffs blocking the rim. We took off our heavy packs and tied a rope to them. Next we climbed up, over, and through the cliffs, much lighter and better balanced. This was no place to slip or look down. Then we pulled our packs up after us and we were on top of the plateau. Now we just had to ascend the slope in front of us for another 400 vertical feet. It did not look very high and was kind of like sand that had hardened. So we started up, not really aware of how steep it was getting. Finally we could barely hold on to the slope, even on all fours. Our packs were threatening to make us slip and send us to the bottom. And it got steeper, and we kept going, higher and still higher. Close to the top we were presented with a ledge about five feet high to climb over. I carefully took off my pack without sliding and stuck it to the slope. I tied a rope to it and climbed over the ledge, just barely. Beyond that the ground got still steeper. Ahead I could go up a short distance but I knew I could not come back down without sliding. The top was still a long ways off over some more ledges and steeper terrain. On both sides of me the ground sloped away very steeply. Sliding off this ridge to either the left or the right would be quite dangerous. So we decided to turn back and try to go back down the way we came and try to find another route. We were beginning to wonder when our wandering would end and where was the right trail to the top of this thing.

Back on the plateau we hiked around the base to an area strewn with boulders. These at least would slow down our slide, and possibly be easier to climb. We found some more footprints and followed them to the top of the slope. We roped up and climbed up the remaining 200’ rock. The summit was about 6’ wide by maybe 15’ long and had a really awesome panoramic view of the desert floor 1100’ below. We ate a lunch of Clif bars on top. The sun was setting as we were hiking out. We went back to Moab for a delicious pasta dinner at Zax. Then back to the Lazy Lizard for some rest.

****Important Notes on Approach: Drive as far as possible on Davis Canyon Road. South Sixshooter is on the second plateau in from the highway. Follow the Davis Canyon Road around the first plateau then split off to the right for the wash area in the second plateau. The shortest route up to the tower is to walk/scramble straight up the wash northeast of the summit. Watch closely for small rock cairns marking this area at the bottom and top of the plateau. There is a hidden chimney that angles up behind a slab at the rim making a safer ascent of the final cliff at the rim. Otherwise you will be confronted with higher walls then you want to climb. Watch for small cairns marking the top and bottom of this chimney. After climbing to the plateau walk left around the bottom of the base until you’re on the South/Southeast side of the tower. Scramble up the area of the base that is full of large boulders. Climb the south face starting up the chimney to the right of the flat level area at the top of the base. Go behind the large flake and belay from there. The next pitch will reach the summit. It’s about a 60m rappel from the summit to the ground so you will have to split it in two or tie ropes. We did one short rap from the summit to a rat’s nest of slings on the ledge below, then a 30m rappel down to the ground. ****

Today we rented bikes again. Or rather Mike and Jonny did. I shuttled them to the top of Porcupine Rim Trail for a 14 mile downhill ride. Then I went back to town and browsed the bookstores and coffee shops of Moab. We met again at the Peace Tree Juice Café for smoothies and relaxation under their patio. Then we went to Eddie McStiffs for supper. Mondo Café was next door so we went over there to find out what we could about area slot canyons to explore. There was a group of big wall guides in there telling stories of climbs they had done all over the world. These guys were the stuff of legends describing the walls they had climbed. The coffee was good. Our wannabe camping buddy was there again. He seemed to follow us everywhere since we met and talked that first evening in Mondo. He was looking for a climbing and camping buddy to share costs with and I think he wanted to climb with us in Moab pretty bad. He even lent us guide books of the area to look at. I hope I didn’t offend him too seriously by not asking him along. But we were not having much luck at finding info on slot canyons. It seems like the more info we found out about them the more there was to find out. Now we had lots of unanswered questions and vague locations. I decided to go over to Pagan Mountaineering and probe their longsuffering staff. They have wonderful employees that, like a lot of Moab residents, come from all over US and Canada. The outdoors is their life and they enjoy sharing the best places to go. They will tell you about their favorite best places to go. It is up to you to get there. Jeanine was from the East Coast and loved slot canyons. She was going to explore a new one the next day. She got a stack of guide books off the shelf, opened up some maps, and helped me look for a good one to go to. She told me about some we would have to rappel into and do serious map and compass work to get back out of. She told us to prepare for a night in there as we might not find our way out right away. These sounded a bit too intense for a first timer. I wanted one we would not have to swim through and one not too difficult that we could do in a half day. She suggested Hidden Splendor off of Pritchett Canyon and marked it on my map and gave me lots of directions, which I memorized and wrote down. We were to hike for a mile and shoot off in a side canyon. After another mile we would be able to cross the fin to our right and find the next canyon and hike back down to the trail. That sounded easy enough until she said we would have to use ropes and rappel in two spots. Rappelling means no backtracking. A canyon by the name of Blue John is a must-see that we can do homework on for next time. Also Negro Bill sounded like a good one to see.

Tuesday morning we ate at Moab Diner again. This place is jammed full every morning and we take that as a sign of good food. We are not proven wrong. We decided to hike back Pritchett Canyon and try to find the rappels before hiking the slot canyon. We hiked back the jeep road and found the side canyons. After hiking in one for a mile, we reached the top and still hadn’t found the rap anchors. We were nearly at the top and didn’t want to go further back into the ‘fins’ because we knew to find our way our way out would become more difficult the further into this mammoth maze we went. So we hiked back out a different way and then went back to the car. We made it to Denver and ate supper at Outback Steakhouse.

Slept in this morning and then drove over to the REI and Wilderness Exchange stores. REI is in a restored power plant turned into an interesting outdoors store. Wilderness Exchange is a store with discount outdoor gear, including used climbing gear. It’s possible to get cosmetic seconds at greatly discounted prices. We left Denver and drove east. Got to relations in Kansas in time for supper and stayed there for night. On Thursday we toured the Hutchinson Salt Mines. That was a tour of an underground salt mine. Very interesting. Stayed another night in Kansas. Friday we slept in and hung around until lunch. Then we hung out some more at grandpas, riding scooters and playing croquet. We attended the anniversary deal in the evening. The next day we drove to Topeka for lunch and spent the night just east of Indianapolis. The next day we slept in and reached home March 18 around 7pm.

5300 car miles and 70 hiking miles each

Labels: Arizona, Grand Canyon, hiking, Moab, mountain biking, rockclimbing, Utah, vacation