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Cedar Mesa Chronicles: Chapter 7

Veterans Day Weekend | Thursday – Sunday, November 10-13, 2022

This year for the extended Veterans Day Weekend I was feeling the pull of the ancients to return to the canyons of Cedar Mesa. Even though I seem to have been neglecting this area for a while now, I decided it was time to follow. As usual, I left from work on Thursday afternoon, drove through Moab and then headed south across Dry Valley to Monticello and Blanding. From there, I made my way west through the Comb Ridge and then up onto Cedar Mesa where I found a spot to camp along the old Emigrant Trail. After a good night of sleep I spent the rest of the weekend exploring a couple of canyons on Cedar Mesa and even made a foray into Lower White Canyon, too.

Exploring Desert Stone: East Canyon to Harts Draw

Tracing the Historic Route of the 1859 Macomb Expedition, Part I
Friday – Sunday, November 4-6, 2022

After being sick and stuck at home over the past two weekends I was really ready to get back outdoors again this weekend! Since I haven’t done much hiking in a couple of weeks I wanted to take it easy this weekend and thought this would be a good opportunity for me to finally start on a project that I have been thinking about doing for over a decade. That project would be to follow part of the historic route of the 1859 Macomb Expedition into the Canyonlands region. Members of a small detachment from this expedition were quite possibly the first non-native Americans to view and describe what is now Canyonlands National Park and leave written and graphic records of what they saw.

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Realm of Rock: Elephant Hill to The Grabens

A Last Minute Trip into The Needles | Friday – Sunday, October 14-16, 2022

This weekend Jackson and I had made plans to go camping and hiking together but we were having trouble deciding where to go and running out of time, especially during this busy Fall Break weekend in southern Utah. On a whim Thursday afternoon we looked to see what campsites were still available in Canyonlands National Park and found that the New Bates Wilson site was open, so I booked it and quickly made last minute plans for us to head into The Needles. To get to the New Bates Wilson campsite we would have to drive over Elephant Hill, so this would also be a great opportunity for me to finally get my new Jeep on a real trail.

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Fiftymile Point to Davis Gulch & The Hole-in-the-Rock

Fiftymile Point to Davis Gulch & The Hole-in-the-Rock

Canyons of the Escalante | Southern Utah Wanderings
Wednesday – Friday, October 5-7, 2022

After spending the last day and a half along the western end of the Vermilion Cliffs we headed back over the Paunsaugunt Plateau and returned to Escalante early on Wednesday afternoon. While we were in town we grabbed some dinner and topped off our fuel tanks before heading southeast down the Hole-in-the-Rock Road below the Straight Cliffs. Surprisingly, the road was in better condition than we were expecting and we made great time to the Davis Gulch Trailhead located just below Fiftymile Point. We still had plenty of time until sunset, so we decided to continue on to the very end of the road so we could maybe hike down the Hole-in-the-Rock to Lake Powell. I hadn’t been out to the end of the Hole-in-the-Rock Road since 2009, so it was nice to refresh my memory of the area.

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Canaan Mountain: Water Canyon to the White Domes

Southern Utah Wanderings | Tuesday & Wednesday, October 4-5, 2022

After leaving Escalante on Monday evening, making our way over the Paunsaugunt Plateau, and driving past the Coral Pink Sand Dunes in the dark to the Block Mesas, we then started heading north on sandy Jeep roads past Elephant Butte so we could hike into the East Fork of the Virgin River on Tuesday morning. Unfortunately, we ended up running into a number of very washed out sections of the roads that stopped our progress and since it was starting to get late we decided to backtrack a bit and find a campsite for the night. Now we would switch our plans around and hike up Water Canyon onto Canaan Mountain on Tuesday morning instead, and then we would see if we wanted try to find another route to The Barracks afterwards.

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Category: Jeeping

Cedar Mesa Chronicles: Chapter 7

Exploring Desert Stone: East Canyon to Harts Draw

Realm of Rock: Elephant Hill to The Grabens

Fiftymile Point to Davis Gulch & The Hole-in-the-Rock

Canaan Mountain: Water Canyon to the White Domes