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White Rim Trail: Mineral Bottom to Candlestick Camp

Island in the Sky | Friday – Sunday, December 5-7, 2025

Although it’s been over three years since the last time I visited the Island in the Sky District within Canyonlands National Park, it certainly has not been for a lack of trying. Over the past few years I have booked the Candlestick Camp on the White Rim at least two or three different times since it’s the only campsite along the White Rim Trail that I have not stayed at before, but each time the weather or ice on the switchbacks of the Mineral Bottom Road made me change those plans. Over the summer I decided to try again and booked the campsite for the first weekend in December with hopes that the weather would cooperate this time, and then I invited my friend Jackson along so he could get his first taste of the White Rim with his new 4Runner. As the weekend neared there was a winter storm system that impacted the areas around Grand Junction and Moab so we weren’t sure what the road situation was going to be like when we reached the top of the switchbacks above Mineral Bottom, but after leaving work on Friday and making our way out there we were happy to find that this area had not been impacted and the switchbacks were clear and dry- so down we went!

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Stillwater Canyon: The Green River in Canyonlands

Floating from Mineral Bottom to The Confluence | Average CFS: 2,590
Friday – Wednesday, September 16-21, 2022

The time had finally come! It was time for me to float the Green River through Stillwater Canyon in Canyonlands National Park and I couldn’t have been more excited! I’ve wanted to float this stretch of the river for many years now but have always put it off for other trips because I was a little concerned about making it to The Confluence in time for the Jetboat shuttle. Our float down Meander Canyon was actually kind of a test to see how easy it would be for us to make that kind of distance in our inflatable kayaks at this time of the year, and we ended up coming up short by about eleven miles on that trip. Still, I made it one of my goals to finally get into Stillwater Canyon this year and booked the Jetboat shuttle back in February. This time I added an extra day to the trip just to make sure we would have enough time to make it to The Confluence. As usual, my friends Jackson and Chris were supposed to join me on this trip, but unfortunately Chris had to back out the week before, so this time it would just be me and Jackson.

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The White Rim to Monument Basin

Friday – Sunday, February 4-6, 2022

For the past two years I have spent the first weekend in February exploring the White Rim in Canyonlands National Park. You can find those two Trip Reports here: White Crack Trail to The Confluence & Airport Tower to Monument Basin. I’ve had good weather and great views on each of those trips so I decided to do it one more time this year and grabbed a camping permit for Gooseberry and Airport back in November before the prices of backcountry permits were raised, so this was going to be my last trip at the old price. I’ve spent a lot of time exploring from the White Rim Trail over the years and am actually running out of places I want to check out, but one place I’ve really wanted to hike down to for a long time is Monument Basin, so I figured this trip would be the perfect opportunity to finally give it a try. I knew Jared would be very interested in this hike, so I made sure to invite him along, too.

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White Rim Trail: Queen Anne Bottom to Taylor Canyon

Friday – Sunday, December 10-12, 2021

Back in October, before the prices of backcountry permits in Canyonlands National Park were set to increase, I decided to grab a couple more permits over the winter for campsites along the White Rim Trail. The first permit I got was for mid-December along the western end of the White Rim Trail at the Hardscrabble Bottom and Taylor Canyon campsites. Both were campsites that I had not stayed at yet. I actually had a permit to stay at the Taylor Canyon campsite two years ago when I was working on completing all of the hiking trails in the Island in the Sky District, but a weather system moving through the area that weekend made me change those plans, so I was looking forward to another opportunity. There were also some short hikes along this section of the White Rim Trail that I wanted to check out last year while Diane and Jared were riding the White Rim, but I ended up not having time for them.

The White Rim: Airport Tower to Monument Basin

Friday – Sunday, February 5-7, 2021

While I had an amazing time supporting Diane and Jared as they biked the White Rim Trail in Canyonlands National Park last October, I didn’t quite have enough time on that trip to get in all the hiking that I had wanted to do because they were riding faster than I had anticipated! Since I had a backpacking trip to The Needles last spring that was cancelled because of COVID and I needed to reschedule that permit or lose in the next few months, I thought it would be nice to head back on my own to the east side of the White Rim so I could make up the hikes I had skipped out on. Last year the weather for our hike from the White Crack to The Confluence in early February was very nice, so I thought I would head back the same weekend this year, too.