Canyonlands Backpacking

Back in March I went to Utah for a hiking trip with Matt and Brad. We walked for several days into Canyonlands and several days within Canyonlands. We didn't finish the route I had planned because it was too ambitious and because of injuries (Matt with lacerations to his shins and ankles from post holing through crusty snow, and Brad with a flare up of a knee injury). But we had a ball romping through stunning country!! 

Start and end points

After a night of partying in Vegas until 3:00AM we got up and on the road at 5:00AM. Matt may not have slept at all and thought it best to allow Brad and no more than a two-hour break from the EDM as he took the first shift driving.

Riding in Matt's Ford Ranger was one of the highlights of the trip because it was so uncomfortable. The person who sat in the middle seat had to put both legs off to the right so that the driver could shift the long handled manual transmission. This forced the middle person to lean against the driver and play footsy with the passenger. The middle seat also lacked a proper backrest and was elevated slightly above the two primary seats, making it such that your butt was on a slope and your back was partially supported.

We crawled along through the desert while sleeping on each other, staring out at the sagebrush and sandstone with delirious eyes, and listening to EDM.

For me, the desert was perhaps more stunning than for the average visitor because I flew directly from Michigan, home of the greyest of winters. As we stopped in a gas station on the drive from Las Vegas to Moab I recall opening the truck door to the smell of plant life and being instantly and fully rejuvenated. Even though we were in a gas station in the middle of the desert and the plant life was a mere green/brown hedge that lined the perimeter of the parking lot, it felt like a heavenly jungle compared to the snowy Midwest. Brad bought Smartfood popcorn and Dr. Pepper, and we moved along.

The Colorado Plateau is without question one of the best places for hiking. There's something about the desert landscape that perpetually entertains the eyes. Deep red and orange sandstone, green and brown cedars, and bright blue and white skies. There’s also something about the desert that satisfies us at a deeper level (read Ed Abbey for more on that).

The fist two days of walking were mostly through snow between 6,000 and 8,000 ft. I thought this would be a nice way to approach Canyonlands. But skis would have nice. Matt wore tiny runner style ankle socks and, in combination with his fast paced post holing, cut up his ankles and shins very well. Gaiters would have also been nice. 

As we were post holing along I was having a grand time being out of Michigan, outside academic buildings, and in the sun. Cracking jokes with Matt and Brad, and hearing their stories, was hilarious. Nine months prior Brad was writing a novel by dictating into this phone while driving a box truck through Denver traffic. Now he was closer to 100,000 words and was writing in coffee shops. Matt had just finished a stint at a super-primo-fancy-swanky biodynamic farm in Ventura, CA and told us all about life there.

After a bunch of up and down we dropped down through some dirt roads, onto horse paths, and eventually into Canyonlands. There, we marveled at the endless possibilities for rock climbing, at the petroglyphs, at the cave dwellings, at two abandoned cabins, and the spiky vegetation. Every turn brought new views. 

We exited the canyons one afternoon, carrying two packrafts that weren’t put to use, and hitched back to the truck one hundred and some road miles south. Matt and I went first, as a pair, and enjoyed six different rides, including an hour and a half in the back of a truck with three Navajo women. We aced the end of the hitch hike by getting a ride with a hunter up five miles of 4x4 roads to our truck just as it was getting dark. Then we picked up Brad from a burger joint (he hitched separately), and drove out of town a few minutes to sleep in BLM land. 

We enjoyed another cramped ten hours in the truck back to Vegas. Matt now knew all the words to our theme song. Brad chowed on Smartfood. I tried not to think about returning to Michigan.