Escalante River Trip, UT

I asked my friend, who is a river rescue training guide and pilot, which small rivers were running and he gave me the most exciting answer ever, "the Escalante!" It rarely runs and when it does the peak is short lived. Thanks to the freezing cold spring, it made the river peak right after Murray High Schools graduation which was Thursday, June 3. My friend, Chris and I, were driving down to Calf Creek, the put-in Friday night. We got a couple of miles in that night and stayed on the river until Friday, June 11. To kayak the Escalante River was a wish I made long ago when I hiked down from Coyote Gulch and saw it's existence. I feel so thankful for the opportunity I had to explore and float for days winding through towering desert varnish walls, with side canyons galore and the desire I had to explore and see it all for the first time!
"Duckie Time" for 7 days and 75 miles! Awesome!
My Rig= 1 water jug (in front), 1 dry bag (in back), 1 waterproof fanny pack (around my waist)
Chris and I hiked two to three side canyons a day. If we saw something that made us curious we would pull over, tie up and hike. This I call a side-hike-workout-scramble.
Escalante River day 1 before it converged with Boulder Creek which doubled it's little size to a bigger little size. We were grateful for catching the peak flow of the Esclante River which peaked and made the river runnable on June 4- June 11

This side hike was around a tall butte loaded with soft orange sand. I liked it a lot!

I believe this side hike to be Scorpion Gulch; it was so overgrown with Poison Ivy that it was impossible to hike. I was so bummed but at the mouth of the canyon we got to hike through really tall Snake Grass.

Before we ventured down the Escalante River we were told we had to hike Neon Canyon. Chris had heard of this canyon before because of it's canyon rapelling, but the hard part was knowing where Neon Canyon was. I will admit, we never really knew where we were on the map because the river has so many turns and side canyons! Lets say we got lucky because we ended up camping at the mouth of Neon Canyon without even knowing it! It was so breathtaking!

This is why canyoneering people go to Neon Canyon to rapell through the waterhole, untie from the end of the rope and drop into a cold pool. I'm in the bottom corner standing below the waterhole: it gives a good scale of the alcove! "Wow!"

Another side hike
Another side hike

Frog Head

We took two, three gallon water jugs and filtered a few times. We scored on our fourth day when we kayaked by a spring that was gushing out of a three hundred foot wall; you couldn't help smiling and being excited about the beautiful water that was clear and cold.

Yoga in an open field of sand. Soon after I was attacked by deer flies! I had to run as fast as I could and jump in the river to get rid of them!
I'm naming this the "Squeeze Drop!"

We portaged a couple times. Once was because of a dangerous rapid, this portage was because gigantic boulders filled the river. We were able to turn the boats sideways and push them through without unloading our gear. Good thing we packed "backpack" style.



River Soaking was apart of our daily minutes

Stevens Arch appears right before Coyote Gulch, our take out.


Hiking Coyote Gulch

One of the hardest things I've ever done- backpacking our gear out of Crack In the Wall, Coyote Gulch. We hiked it three times because we had two loads.

This is Chris and our gear at the top of the Crack, which had to be pulled up the cliff by rope.

My first load, at least 50 - 55 pds, the heaviest pack I've ever had!

Chris's first load, at least 60 - 65 pds!

We made a stretcher out of the kayak paddles and leap frogged our gear; everyone thought we were carrying out a body. This is Chris taking a break on the pile of crap :) at the half way point. It took us 7 hours. We HOTELed IT after that!