Natural Bridges Nov 22

From Page we drove on through the Navajo Nation, past Hopi Buttes and Monument Valley, over the Green River, up the engineering feat that is the Moki Dugway, and across Cedar Mesa to a new stop for me, Natural Bridges National Monument. It is a small national monument covering a part of the canyon network ultimately draining into the Black Hole of White Canyon. It's name and designation come from an unusual density of natural bridges (i.e. three) but as I found out is also notable for its ruins. 

Agathla Peak

After getting the lay of the land and finding a choice spot at the campground, Heather drove the start of the park loop to drop me off at the Sipapu Bridge trailhead for my hike past three natural bridges through the canyon network. The view from the trailhead across the White Canyon headwaters was fairly spectacular. I said my goodbyes at 2pm and set a 4:30p pickup at the other end of the park.

Trailhead view looking into White Canyon

The trail down through the Cedar Mesa Sandstone was more interesting than I would have guessed with cut steps into slick rock and two bolted ladders to climb down. In only about ten minutes I was on the canyon floor starring up at Sipapu Bridge (frontispiece) overhead. All three natural bridges are the result of canyon meanders being breached. After a few photos I continued downcanyon. I did not know what to expect for a trail (it could have been miles of obnoxious basketball-sized boulder hopping), but soon recognized that most sediment benches had an excellent and not too sandy trail to follow back and forth across and down the drainage. I brought plenty of extra layers just in case but with the constant movement found it pleasant enough to hike in just a shirt. I knew there was a ruin of some description on canyon right after the Deer Canyon confluence and climbed up to see the cluster of structures known as Horse Collar Ruins. These were pretty interesting with several multi-room structures including sleeping rooms and a particularly unique adobe double granary structure with a deep "tub" between the two, also apparently for storage.

Horse Collar Ruins (and below)

I continued on. Unsurprisingly with the ruins and rocks the hike reminded me a lot of a long multi-day hike along the length of Grand Gulch from a Thanksgiving years before. Patches of sun ensured that the hike was not completely freezing like that incredibly cold hike. The canyon was also not quite as sinuous, which meant more forward progress. At one spot a particularly nice canyon wall loomed on the left. Soon after I turned the corner to see the tell-tale window of Kachina Bridge. Kachina Bridge was certainly the chunkiest of the three bridges, and also clearly younger than Sipapu with its limited downcutting since abandoning its meander. This bridge occurs right at a major confluence leading to some extra confusion and head scratching on my part.

Kachina Bridge (and below)

Past Kachina Bridge trail signs pointed upward onto a cliff bench but I was thinking this was the trail heading up to the loop road and so I stubbornly followed the streambed. I very soon came to the base of a dryfall with a slot canyon partially cut into it and a deep pool at the base. I would have to turn back to regain the trail but was confused at this feature I thought was a downstream opposing dryfall. It took me several minutes of total confusion but I eventually recognized I was now heading upstream up a tributary, rather than downstream as I naively thought. That confusion out of the way, I continued hiking. 

A few canyon bends further I checked my map to realize I passed a "ruin view" placemark. I was curious enough to drop my backpack and backtrack along the canyon. Sure enough in the vicinity of the placemark I could see a very well preserved ruin high up on a ledge on canyon left. Looking around the way up was not obvious at all but I decided to invest about a half hour trying to see if there was a reasonable approach. After a few deadends, I ultimately figured out the obscure approach zigzagging upward and around from one ledge to the next until I was finally at the right elevation. I traversed back around the corner and followed the narrow ledge to a rather stately alcove and the ruin that an ammo can register would tell me was known as Perfect Granary. It indeed was a remarkably well-preserved granary with not a rock or stick out of place. I was rather thrilled to stumble upon this unlisted ruin; the gambled effort paid off.

Perfect Granary (interior below)

Back down to my backpack I now had to speed up to get to the trailhead pickup on time. Right as the trail exits the canyon floor to traverse a ledge I ran into Heather and the kids, great timing. Heather and David wanted to walk a bit more so Claire and I moseyed onward, with snack stops, mud stops, and ice play stops. We soon came to Owachomo Bridge, arguably the thinnest and most picturesque. A few quick photos and we continued up to the trailhead with Heather and David not far behind. I was happy to be able to get in my 6.5 mile/2.5 hour jaunt but could tell there was much more to see in the area. I also enjoyed the solitude of not seeing anyone else until the end of the hike.

Owachomo Bridge

We had a nice evening in the campground with a warm fire and aluminum foil wrapped Thanksgiving dinner cooking on the fire. It would be another cold night but thankfully no wind.

White Pocket Nov 21

 

Heather and I had been interested in checking out White Pocket since our trip to Coyote Buttes South ignited our interest in exploring all of the most swirly, unusual patches of Arizona Strip slickrock. Though free from permits like a couple of the other areas, it was guarded by the reputation for deep sandy access roads. We did some more research (Heather in particular) and decided that buddying up with another vehicle and having shovels, sand planks, and an air compressor would be enough to give us (i.e. Heather's Subaru Forester) a good chance at success. The cold off-season temperatures would likely only help firm up the sand too. We drove with kids slowly across California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Arizona, Utah, and then to the Arizona-Utah boundary. Happily we found the first-come, first-served Stateline Campground to be only half full and camped 50ft into Arizona.

After a cold night we awoke to find that Keith, Kari, and Zora had arrived sometime in the night. Things were painfully cold until the first sunlight finally crested the western edge of the Vermilion Plateau and everyone finally start to thaw into action. I led the caravan into White Pocket. The route in was better marked than expected. The sand yes was deep and loose in a few places but thankfully there were hard patches on slickrock to intermittently break up the driving and provide psychological islands in the sea of sand. Thankfully the AWD cars did just fine with our experienced driving and we made it to White Pocket in less than an hour's drive.

We started off into the slickrock together but I almost immediately was mesmerized by trying to get to the top of one of the more prominent formations and branched off. Once on top the drone called me to fly over the bizarrely swirling landscape. The region was in a BLM administered national monument, which meant I could fly to heart's content. I did my best to avoid the couple other groups but I suspect the overhead buzzing was still probably annoying. The overhead vantage really added interest to a lot of the strange and completely unique erosional patterns.

After burning through a couple batteries I hiked over to join the others for a mid-morning snack and some more on the ground exploring. We walked around the main formations for about a mile, my camera at the ready nearly every step. 

We ended our loop hike on the white brain rocks before heading back to the car. The drive out had a lot more oncoming traffic which complicated the soft sand driving (as well as the warming day) and there were much more sections where I "boated" our way through the sand. Once at House Rock Rd we parted with Keith who was headed north, while we headed south. We stopped briefly at the Cliff Dweller hoodoos and again at the Marble Canyon Bridge, then it was on to Page for a warm motel break from the cold camping.

Santa Ana River Trail Oct 17

I had done a mountain bike on the Santa Ana River Trail a few years before with Keith, 29 miles from Angelus Oaks down the Post Office loop to South Fork then back on Middle Control Road. This time he invited me to join him and a couple others to bike the full SART from South Fork back to his house in Redlands, 39 miles with 2600ft elevation gain and plenty of total loss. The others clearly more capable bikers than me, my old bike being one-fifth to one-tenth the worth of the other individual bikes, and myself being deep in a pandemic fitness slump, I was fully expecting to be the weak link and struggling to keep up. The bigger question to me was what would break first, me or my bike; despite my 27-speed bike dropping down to 3 functional gears by the end of the ride, I think I was the one that broke first.

I was the only one that opted not to start with a jacket layer and the cool mountain air cut through my lungs and goosebumped my arms for the first few minutes out of South Fork. Happily I quickly warmed as I tried to keep pace with Keith and had no regrets about the jacket. This upper part of the trail was much as I remembered it, fast, swooping corners in and out of gullies, often with thin screed out sections of trail and steep dropoffs to suffer if my balance was ever so slightly off. To add to the challenge many of the shady corners had surprising patches of snow covering the trail from the freak thunderstorm event about a week prior. The section closest to Glass Rd remained one of my favorites, particularly flowy and fast singletrack. I more-or-less managed to keep up with the others until we started the Middle Control Rd climb. Here they smoked me while my low fitness levels let me down more than my bike. Eventually I reached Angelus Oaks. After catching my breath and a quick snack we continued on, the rest of the ride now new to me. 

Looking up Mill Creek

After dropping off the forest road back onto singletrack, I was surprised that somehow the trail seemed even steeper and narrower. I clinged white knuckled to my handlebars for dear life hoping I did not bounce my way off the cliff. I was managing until we reached Thomas Hunting Grounds where my rear shifter cable snapped. Keith locked it in place and I took my considerable handicap, from 27 speeds now down to three. I did my best but certainly began to limp further behind the others as we continued.

Dropping off Morton Peak

At the base of Morton Peak I was severely tempted to call it quits, ride out the highway and meet the others in Redlands but decided to fight on up the last uphill, slowly walking my bike. I was in pain, my calves burning but made it up to the others for the final screaming downhill. Traversing some of the Tertiary sandstones, the trail was different in style, perhaps not quite so steep but still technical with plenty of challenge. We rode out the creek and through the backroads of Redlands, eventually getting back to Keith's. After downing a milkshake I shuttled Keith back up to South Fork before heading home. It was a solid, exhausting day with 5 hours of dense activity. It would have been better if I was in better shape and my bike as well but it was still excellent to be able to get out for a bigger ride.

Bodie Ghost Town Oct 3

Bodie is another one of those tucked away places I somehow managed to miss seeing until now. We did some Poverty Hills fieldwork on the drive up, a quick crowded soak at Wild Willys, a smoky drive past dinner at the Lee Vining Mobil, and then camped on the chilly north shore of Mono Lake. The next morning we drove into Bodie for a stroll around this remarkably well-preserved ghost town doing its best to defy the rough elements (often being one of the coldest and windiest places in the state if not the country). The "open air museum" style of the place is really quite unique and we had a good time looking at all the little details of the buildings, the in stasis disarray of the interiors as they were abandoned, and trying to imagine what life would have been like in this remote dry valley. It was staggering to learn that less than one-tenth of Bodie's buildings remain from its heyday- it would have been a jampacked, bustling place. I'll let the photos speak for themselves.