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Canyons of the San Rafael Reef III

Iron Wash to Mormon Tanks Canyon | Friday – Sunday, November 14-16, 2025

I was originally hoping to spend this weekend searching for ruins and rock art on Cedar Mesa, but a wet and snowy weather forecast wasn’t looking good for that area, so instead I decided to stay a bit closer to home and head over to the San Rafael Reef Wilderness where I could explore a few new canyons. I left after work on Friday afternoon, topped off my gas tank in Green River and then made my way over to the foot of the San Rafael Reef where I found a campsite after dark, read for a little while and went to bed early. On Saturday morning I got up before sunrise and started hiking up Iron Wash at dawn. Although I have hiked up Iron Wash before, I don’t recall going very far, and besides it was so long ago that and I don’t remember much about it and was looking forward to checking out this canyon again and going further this time.

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Fall Colors on the Grand Mesa 2025

After Work Adventures | Tuesday, September 23, 2025

I’m not going to have very much time to chase fall colors this season, so I decided to head up onto the Grand Mesa after work this afternoon to spend a few hours seeing how the colors were coming along so far this year. I’m glad that I did since the colors were almost at peak and looking pretty great just about everywhere I went, including at my favorite overlook at Skyway Point. I also took a chance exploring some new areas that I had never been to before and found some nice patches of colors along the way. It was a nice way to spend a few hours until sunset this evening!

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Fringes of the Raggeds: Yule Pass to Daisy Pass

Raggeds Wilderness | Friday – Sunday, September 5-7, 2025

This weekend I returned to the Elk Mountains near Crested Butte so I could hike up to two passes in the Ruby Range that have been on my to-do list for far too long, both of which are found along the fringes of the Raggeds Wilderness above the Slate River Valley. Even though I didn’t have the best experience trying to find a campsite near Crested Butte back in July, there are still a lot of places in the area that I want to hike and explore so I decided to give it another shot after Labor Day weekend, which seemed to work out much better this time. As usual, I left from work on Friday afternoon, stopped for a quick dinner in Delta and then took the Kebler Pass Road over into Crested Butte and followed the Slate River up to the Paradise Divide where I found a campsite for the night. It started to rain on and off while I was driving over Kebler Pass which would keep up throughout the rest of the evening. Once I was settled in at camp I spent the remainder of the evening wandering around Paradise Divide when it wasn’t raining.

The Fourth: Cunningham Gulch & Stony Pass

Independence Day | Thursday – Friday, July 3-4, 2025

This holiday weekend Jackson and I were planning to spend three days backpacking a segment of the Colorado Trail through the Weminuche Wilderness, but unfortunately I started to have some issues with the elevation on Thursday night while we were camped up in Cunningham Gulch and I had to drive down lower in the middle of the night to start feeling better and to try to get some sleep. With that in mind, I figured it probably wasn’t a good idea to head off into the high Wilderness of the Weminuche where a retreat to lower terrain would not be as quick and easy, so we cancelled those plans on Friday morning and decided to just go on a shorter hike along the Continental Divide and then spend the rest of the day testing both of our new vehicles by driving over Stony Pass. Between the recent vehicle troubles and not feeling well at elevation, my mountain season has not gotten off to a great start this year, but I am hoping that things will start getting better soon. Even though we didn’t get to go on our backpacking trip this weekend, we did experience some excellent foggy and cloudy conditions on Friday morning that were fun to photograph, so that was a positive! These are some photos from our truncated Independence Day weekend.

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Monument Canyon, Wedding Canyon & Kodels Canyon

Heart of the World | Saturday, March 15, 2025

After staying home early on Saturday morning so I could try to get a permit for Desolation Canyon at 8:00am and was successful, Diane and I hopped into the Jeep and started driving west towards Utah since we initially were planning to spend the rest of the day exploring Eagle Park within Arches National Park. However, as we were speeding along I-70 between Grand Junction and Fruita the clouds from the storm that had passed through the area overnight were clearing and the view over to the Colorado National Monument was looking very nice, so we decided to change up our plans and go hike the loop in Monument Canyon and Wedding Canyon instead.

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Tag: clouds

Canyons of the San Rafael Reef III

Fall Colors on the Grand Mesa 2025

Fringes of the Raggeds: Yule Pass to Daisy Pass

The Fourth: Cunningham Gulch & Stony Pass

Monument Canyon, Wedding Canyon & Kodels Canyon