Paria Canyon Trip Report: April 25-28, 2007

"What draws us into the desert is the search for something intimate in the remote."--Edward Abbey

This report will tell the story of our 20+ mile backpacking trip down Buckskin Gulch and up Paria Canyon. This is not a technical trip report (we did not even know the correct time), there are plenty of those out there if you are looking for that. Clocks are irrelevant out here, the only schedule that needs following is the one provided by nature and moderated by father time, which is precisely the beauty of it. Here is my pictorial and written interpretation of the trip:

I had to fly into Las Vegas and drive 3+ hours to Kanab, Utah (my hometown), passing the nearby community of Colorado City, AZ⁄Hildale, UT, which is a polygamist community. In passing I noticed a new restaurant, The Merry Wives, which I found very intriguing. Yes, I grew up about 30 minutes from a full-on polygamist community, like the one portrayed on Big Love. We always affectionately referred to community members as Plygs (but not too affectionately, lest we be associated too closely with them) and I always viewed them as oddly mysterious, yet extremely compelling, as it seems the rest of the world has been feeling about them in recent years. As a family counselor I would be thrilled to do a structural family diagram on one of these families, but I digress, back to the trip.

My sister, Kari, and her new boyfriend, Dave (pictured left on right) drove from the Northern Utah⁄Southern Idaho area. Dave, is a brave soul, going into the wilderness with two of Kari’s closest relatives right after meeting them. This could prove to be a real test for him (I’ll spare you the suspense--he passed). I have always subscribed to the theory that a trip like this can make or break a relationship.

We met up with my dad in Kanab, where he lives. My dad, Richard (shown below), likes to think of himself as a real mountain man and was aptly tagged the "Crocodile Dundee of the West" by my sister-in-law on a previous backpacking adventure in the Grand Canyon. I think he is probably the nearest thing to a mountain man you will find in the US in this day. He lives very close to the land as a water well driller in the desert Southwest.

That evening we parked one car at the White House trailhead where we would be exiting. After a one night stay in the Victorian Charm Inn (which strangely rents a room with 2 queen beds and a whirlpool bathtub directly in the room, no separate bath, not sure who would want a room like that, people who like to bathe together, but not sleep together?) we planned to begin our trip into the canyon early Wednesday morning since we knew we would have to cover about 13.5 miles on the first day. Well, as usual, our early morning turned into late morning ( it wasn’t because I took a long bath, since I opted against the shared bathing experience with my roommates, I would not be staying clean long in the canyon anyway) and we arrived at the Wire Pass trailhead, which is about 45 minutes from Kanab, at around 10 am. Notice our matching outfits, it is not clear whether that was planned or not.

The Wire Pass trailhead cuts off a few miles of Buckskin Gulch. It wasn’t long before we hit the ice cold pools of water that we would contend with for much of the upper Buckskin Gulch. We actually had it easy compared to what I have read from some other trip reports, possibly from the low snow accumulation this year and other factors. The deepest pool we encountered was about chest high for me.
Dave carried his pack and Kari’s pack on his head to keep it dry, but I decided to try out the effectiveness of the new rain guard I got for my pack, besides my neck isn’t that strong. It kept the water out pretty well. We were pretty wet after that.

The water was so cold that our feet were numb quickly, but, even though they were already wet, we would still do just about anything to keep our feet out of the water, even if it meant scaling the wall as we did in these pictures (shown left).

There were some extremely narrow sections of the canyon and awesome sand sculpted walls.

At times it felt like we were coming up on a dead end until you were right at the end and could finally see where the trail turned. It reminded me of one of those labrynths, difficult to figure out where you were because of the tall walls, you could get lost in the amazing views forever, except there were fewer options for turning.

This is definitely not where you would want to be in a flash flood. The evidence of the power of flash floods was all around, we saw things like large tractor tires and large barrels on the floor of the canyon or lodged between the walls that could have only gotten there with extreme force. Here are some examples: a rock and barrel jam

some log jams, the last of which I took a picture of and then proceeded to bump my head on as I went under, HELLO!

This jam was interesting, and more difficult to navigate, as we had to crawl military-style on our stomachs to get under it.

As the sun passed the high point in the sky, it got much darker in the slot canyon and like so many of the other trip reports I read, we had overestimated our progress and were unsure just how far we had gone and what kind of time we were actually making. None of has had thought to bring a watch, not that any of us were that concerned with time. I usually prefer setting up camp before dark, even with the option of using my cool headlamp, and we really did not have a clue as to the time and could not see where the sun was from inside the slot. I was yawning, I think partially due to my being a couple of time zones away from my usual, and my body was getting weary. There was no doubt in my mind that we would reach the confluence and safe camping that day, but not knowing just how much further was a little hard to accept. This was also the point in which I noticed that the LCD screen on my camera had stopped working (I think I had banged it on a rock when scrambling over something). It was still taking pictures, but I had no clue how they were turning out because my camera was making lots of strange noises.

The canyon continued to be awesome at every turn, but my concern for the end of our hike day began to outweigh my awe. I was looking forward to finally, making it to the boulder jam, which is one of the harder landmarks to miss, so I could have a better idea of where we were. At this point I would at least know that we had about a mile left. We finally got there, Dave and Kari arrived first, and began the downclimb and lowering of packs that was required. I was ecstatic to finally know we were almost there. I can hike a mile on pure will power, so knowing that was all that was left was very comforting. It wasn’t dark yet, and all signs said we would be there before dark. YES!

I have a distinct memory of the last mile of the hike wherein I had to work hard to stay focused, while not dwelling on the pain that I was beginning to feel in my ankles and back from the 40-pound pack I had been carrying. I actually sang (in my mind) the entire song of 99 bottles of beer on the wall to pass the time and distract myself from the pain. That is the first time I have made it through the entire song. I regret not taking better advantage of the views even though I regularly reminded myself to look up and at least notice them in that last mile.

Arriving at camp has rarely felt so good! We were all quite content, even though the only site left happened to be the most exposed one in the area. We were just happy to be able to get off of our feet. Just like a cowboy in the old west, my dad took his usual position, out under the stars for the night.

On previous backpacking trips, we often felt that we have not given ourselves enough time to really enjoy ourselves because of the long distances that we had to cover each day, so this time we gave ourselves more than enough time. Knowing that the first day was going to be a long and strenuous one, we planned the second day to be a really easy one so that our bodies could rest. The following day, as planned, we did a little bit of day hiking. We hiked beyond the confluence and on down the Paria with only our day packs for a few miles. For some reason we had expected something more grand at the meeting of the two canyons and I think we were surprised at how insignificant the actual confluence of the Buckskin and Paria seemed (shown left).

Other than moving to a different site in the same campground area and the short hike we did not do much that day besides rest, and what a rest it was!!! Here (left) is a strange scene from camp. It would probably be difficult for some people to be this disconnected from society and doing nothing at all, but for me it was absolute bliss........

The flapping sound of the crows wings echoing off the canyon wall reminded me of something from Star Wars. We saw very little life, some lizards, bats, and the occasional group of passing hikers (I will expound on this in a later post). It rained for a few minutes in the evening, and we all piled in the tent. After it stopped, I joined my dad out under the stars that second night, and was only bothered slightly by the mosquitos and the 2 snoring members of our group, the snores amplified by the tall canyon walls. I thought I could feel Edward Abbey’s spirit nearby.

We woke up the next morning fully recovered with strong bodies, ready to hike for another day. Unfortunately, we ran out of fuel for our stove and came up a little short for coffee. It wasn’t long into our hike day when we realized that the going was much quicker up Paria Canyon than it had been coming down the Buckskin Gulch. Although, still beautiful in a different way, the Paria River did not have the same kind of hold on me that the Buckskin had. It was not nearly as narrow and shady and it quickly warmed up to uncomfortably hot temperatures.

In time we were wondering what we were going to do in that hot canyon with the day and a half we had left. Someone in the group thought it might be a good idea to hike all the way out that day. At first, I felt some ambivalence about finishing the trip a day early. Was I really ready to leave the solitude of the canyon?

It finally came down to the coffee. Another morning in the canyon sounded nice, but no coffee? This realization brought me around and I immediately started thinking of all of the things I could do with the extra time. The pull of my responsibilites in the world got its tight little grip on me, and like a magnet drew me out of that canyon quicker than the quicksand that couldn’t manage (try as it may) to keep us there. We were out by the early afternoon, but not before I was able to get a load of these views.

My dad took some time to explore these caves. He climbed up in this one, I believe he was thinking it would make a damn fine home.

The 10 miles out that day came to an end in an instant as we victoriously returned to the car parked at the White House trailhead and prepared to head back to Kanab. As we pulled away I gave a quick wistful glance at that desert canyon oasis that so quickly and easily brought me back to my true roots.

"To be whole. To be complete. Wildness reminds us what it means to be human, what we are connected to rather than what we are separate from."-- Terry Tempest Williams

Comments

[Jess]

WOW! Looks like lots of fun :) I really enjoyed reading your blog!

[Kallie Cothern]

Thank you! Wish I could have seen you when I dashed through. We had a great time.

[Esther]

It's so gorgeous!!! I've never been to any canyon- it looks so peaceful!

[Jen]

Truly amazing! Loving the blog.

[Rob Watson]

Great pics and great travelogue. I did this trip with Nathan when we were in Boy Scouts and it is one of the things about my youth that will always stay with me. We didn't do the Buckskin, but we started at White House and came out at Lee's Ferry. I've always wanted to do the Buckskin route though and this has given me more curiosity to do that.

Thanks!