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Tag: wind

Desolation Canyon & Gray Canyon of the Green River

Splitting the Tavaputs Plateau in Two: Sand Wash to Swaseys Beach
Sunday – Saturday, May 11-17, 2025 | Average CFS: 6,665

After getting permits for Yampa Canyon and the Canyon of Lodore over the past two years, Jackson’s and my main goal for this year was to try and get a Spring Low-Use Season permit for the Green River through Desolation Canyon and Gray Canyon as we continue to work our way through more sections of the Colorado River and Green River across the Colorado Plateau. Although Jackson and I have still have never actually won a permit in any of the lotteries we have entered over the years we have been lucky enough to grab permits and cancellations during the general releases after the fact, and this time I managed to get us a permit for Desolation Canyon back in mid-March. Once we had the permit we quickly got started on the planning process since the launch date was only about two months away, but we quickly found out that many of our usual river friends were unable to make the trip this spring. Luckily, our friends Bob and Lisa were able to go and they had a few other friends that they were able to invite on the trip with us, two of whom were very familiar with Desolation Canyon and were a great addition to the trip! In the end I enjoyed rafting with everyone who was on this trip and would invite every single one of them back in a heartbeat!

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Gunnison Gorge: Red Rocks to Gunnison Forks

Gunnison Gorge National Conservation Area | Friday – Sunday, April 25-27, 2025

After going on a last minute trip into the Labyrinth Canyon Wilderness in Utah last weekend, I wanted to stay even closer to home this weekend and thought that this would be a good opportunity for me to return to the Black Canyon of the Gunnison. Although as of last June I have hiked all of the official trails within Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, there are still quite a few trails and roads in the Gunnison Gorge National Conservation Area that I have not hiked or driven yet, so I figured I could check out a few more of them as I continue to explore the area more thoroughly. I left from work on Friday afternoon and made my way down to the Gunnison Gorge.

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From The Maze to The Mesa, Again…

Friday – Sunday, March 28-30, 2025

This weekend I met up with my friend Alan who was once again visiting the southwest from France for a couple of weeks this spring. Late last year while he was starting to plan out his trip we had made rough plans to hike together to a Barrier Canyon Style pictograph panel that is found in the Maze District of Canyonlands National Park, so that’s where we ended up starting our weekend off when we met up at a campsite late on Friday afternoon. After our rough drive and hike to the pictographs on Saturday morning we then made our way over to Cedar Mesa so we could explore a few sites before I headed home early on Sunday as I needed to finish getting prepared for an upcoming river trip into the Grand Canyon. Since this trip was a little reminiscent of my previous week spent exploring The Maze and The Mesa in 2011, I thought I would borrow the title again. Here are a few photos from the weekend.

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Paria Canyon: White House to Lees Ferry

Canyons of the Paria | Tuesday – Sunday, March 18-23, 2025

Backpacking along the Paria River through the tight narrows and massive gorge of the lower Paria Canyon across the Vermilion Cliffs National Monument has been on my to-do list for well over a decade now, and even though I’ve tried to schedule this hike a number of times in the past it seems that something has always come up causing a change of plans- most notably on our last attempt about two years ago when cold temperatures, flash flooding and multiple deaths in the canyon made us change our minds about the hike at the very last minute. This year I wanted to take another gamble on the weather in middle-to-late March and grabbed a permit back on December 1st while Diane and I were driving home from a long weekend in the Bears Ears for Thanksgiving and hoped that I would be able to use it this time.

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Wolverton Canyon and the Transmission Site

Friday – Sunday, March 7-9, 2025

After backpacking into Chesler Park last weekend, I left from work on Friday afternoon to spend this weekend on the west side of the Green River around the Labyrinth Canyon Wilderness to do a little hiking and to search for a large alcove that contains a Barrier Canyon Style pictograph panel that I’ve been trying to find for a while now. I was initially planning to spend the weekend on my own, but shortly before I left from work on Friday Jared contacted me and was going to be able to join me after all, so we made last minute plans to meet up later that night at camp, although I knew I’d be fast asleep by the time he arrived- and I was. These are some photos from our weekend.

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