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Sid’s Mountain Wilderness Trip Reports

San Rafael River: Fuller Bottom to Lockhart Box

Friday – Sunday, June 2-4, 2023

This weekend Jared and I met up in the San Rafael Swell so we could float the San Rafael River with our packrafts while there was still enough water left this year. Although our last packrafting trip together on the Dirty Devil River may not have gone as well as we had hoped, Jared was looking forward to getting his packraft on a river that actually had enough water this time and I was looking forward to a return visit into the Little Grand Canyon! I left from work on Friday afternoon and made ...

Sauntering Around The Swell: The Northwest Side

Muddy Creek to the Little Wedge | San Rafael Swell Rock Art XVII
Friday – Sunday, April 21-23, 2023

As I was trying to figure out where I wanted to go this weekend, I realized that I had not been back to the San Rafael Swell since Diane and I did a little mountain biking on the Good Water Rim Trail over the Halloween weekend in 2021, and I thought that this would be a good time to finally get back out there to remedy that oversight. As usual, I left after work on Friday afternoon and headed west into ...

Cane Wash: Locomotive Point to the San Rafael River

Friday – Saturday, November 6-7, 2020

I was originally planning to spend three days alone on Cedar Mesa this weekend, but the weather forecast had other plans for me with rain and snow predicted for much of that time. So instead of driving all the way down to Cedar Mesa and getting shut down by the weather, I planned to stay a little closer to home in the San Rafael Swell so I could try to get a hike in on Saturday morning and then head home before the storm arrived. I decided that hiking down Cane Wash to the ...

Hondu Country: Upper Muddy Creek Gorge

Tomsich Butte to Poor Canyon, Road Hollow to Fix-It Pass & Slipper Arch
Friday & Saturday, May 1-2, 2020

I was originally supposed to be in the San Rafael Swell this weekend for an event that was cancelled due to the current COVID-19 pandemic, but since most of Utah, including Emery County, was open to camping again I decided to still head into the Swell so I could spend Saturday hiking and exploring more of the Muddy Creek Wilderness. I’ve gone on a couple of great trips along the Muddy Creek over the past few years and have been looking ...

Little Grand Canyon: Floating the San Rafael River

Fuller Bottom to the Swinging Bridge
Friday – Sunday, June 21-23, 2019

When I decided to float The Chute of Muddy Creek a couple of weeks ago I thought at the time that I was making a decision between doing that or floating the San Rafael River this year. I really didn’t think that the San Rafael River would have enough water left for me to float it later this month and I had already made plans for last weekend’s trip through Slick Rock Canyon. I was very wrong about that and was surprised to see that it was still ...

Sids Mountain

Friday – Sunday, March 23-25, 2018

This weekend I decided to take a break from exploring Canyonlands National Park and Bears Ears National Monument, so I headed over to the San Rafael Swell instead. This allowed me to avoid driving through the area surrounding Moab during the popular and very busy Easter Jeep Safari. I had decided earlier this year as I was making my plans for the spring that it was finally time to hike to the Kofford Cabin on Sids Mountain since it had been on my to-do list for a pretty long time. Originally, I was planning ...

Windy Weekend in The Swell

Saturday & Sunday, April 29-30, 2017

After staying up late the last four nights in a row to attend concerts and then getting up for work early the following mornings, it was finally time for me to sleep in on Saturday! I woke up around 9:00am (I really cannot recall the last time I slept in that late), packed my camping gear into the Jeep and started driving west to the San Rafael Swell where I would spend the rest of the day hiking in canyons and searching for rock art. It was very windy out all day, which is ...