Canyoneering: Quandary Canyon

Don Reyes, masterfully lobbing a potshot in Quandary Canyon.

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Quandary Canyon in the southern San Rafael Swell is known for the technical difficulties presented by a series of potholes in the mid-section of the canyon.  Difficulty depends on water levels--when the water is high, you can jump or rappel into each hole and swim to the lip on the other side.  When the water is low, you find yourself in cold water, deep in a polished bowl, with no way to climb out.  From time to time people get permanently stuck in these holes, but if you are prepared and with a group of people, it isn't so hard to engineer your way out.

During our descent in October, the water levels were pretty high, but not high enough to just swim to the lips of the holes.  We climbed out of some of them, and used potshots for others.  A potshot is just a bag of sand tied to a rope that you  toss over the lip of a pothole as a counterweight, and use to hand over hand out (see picture above).  

As winter finally tries to settle in here in Laramie, warm desert canyons start to look even more appealing.  I'm already anticipating our next trip, probably to Zion, in the late spring.

Starting the day--Larry Scritchfield, Scott Lehman, Don Reyes, and Jim Akers.

Scott Lehman, early in Quandary.

A view down the Quandary Canyon drainage.

Don and Scott, contemplating a small pourover.

The beginning of the technical difficulties.

Larry, contemplating a slide into a pothole.

Jim and Scott, mid-canyon.

Middle Quandary.

Larry taking a leap of faith into a pothole.

Larry rappelling into another pothole

Scott and Don.

Don, preparing to climb out of a pothole using a potshot.

The hot exit hike back to Ramp Canyon, which leads back through the Swell to our camp.

The technical climb-out in Ramp Canyon:  dicey.

Dinner!

Canyoneering: Baptist Draw to Upper Chute

Jim Akers, enjoying the sunset at our camp near Baptist Draw, San Rafael Swell, Utah.

(Click images to enlarge.)

Here's the quandary (more on Quandary Canyon later):  

Canyoneering provides the chance to descend some of the most beautiful canyons in Utah with a bunch of good friends while executing a series of sometimes bizarre and interesting maneuvers to overcome obstacles along the way.  All of this makes for heartbreaking photo opportunities, but at the same time, threatens to destroy your expensive camera gear with water, mud, sand, and high impacts with rock.  And the light is difficult as well--deep dark canyons mixed with intensely bright spots of sunshine and slivers of sky mean that no camera can handle the dynamic range.  You can expose for the darkness, where all the action is taking place, and the sky blows out.  Or you can expose for the sky, but then the action is in blackness unless you somehow light it up with a bunch of flashes, which are also expensive, time consuming to set up, and targets of destruction for the same reasons I already talked about.  Not only that, but your hands are full just trying to get yourself through whatever canyon you are in without taking forever to set up shots so that you aren't vulnerable to afternoon storms and the ire of your peers, who have to wait for you every time you stop.  

My solution:  take fairly crappy pictures with a less-expensive and smaller point-and-shoot camera than my big DSLR. I use a Nikon P7000, which I'm not that happy with for a number of reasons, but that at least it won't put me in debtor's prison if it gets destroyed.  It takes pretty good pictures in good light, but doesn't do very well in darkness, and I can't see the screen on the back very well to compose images because I don't carry my reading glasses with me when I'm canyoneering.  Sometimes it's just more important to have fun than to obsess over good photographs.

Last weekend I made a quick trip to the San Rafael Swell and dealt with all of these photographic problems, but had a great time.  Larry Scritchfield, Don Reyes, and Jim Akers had already been there for a week when Scott Lehman and I arrived, so they were a little tired.  We did Quandary Canyon on Friday (a future blog post), and then on Saturday Jim, Scott, and I did Baptist Draw to Upper Chute while Larry and Don started their long drives home to Tucson and Reno. 

Baptist/Chute is a gorgeous loop, minimally difficult, with just a few rappels and some groveling under and over chockstones, followed by miles of undulating narrow canyon.  Even the exit and hike back to camp is enjoyable--a long pretty walk up a little side canyon punctuated by easy slickrock steps around obstacles.  As always, details are on Tom's Canyoneering website.  This would be a nice trip for an adventurous family if the kids aren't afraid to get on a rope now and then and the parents aren't afraid to lower them off of cliffs.

Rappelling from Baptist into Chute.

Upper Chute.

Upper Chute.

Jim Akers.  Upper Chute.

Jim and Scott enjoying some rare sunshine -- Upper Chute.

Jim and Scott.  Upper Chute.

Jim, Upper Chute.

Jim, Upper Chute.  

Off to Utah

Bei, Cedar Mesa, 2007

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I'm off to Utah this afternoon for four days.  Destination:  the San Rafael Swell.  Mission:  swim around in "keeper" potholes and try to escape from them to make down-canyon progress.  Team:  Larry Scritchfield, Jim Akers, Don Reyes, Scott Lehman.  Missing:  Steve Millard (who thinks passing a professional certification test is more important).

I'll report on how it all goes when I return next week, after I finish panicking about all the work I'm blowing off. 

Have a great weekend.  

Jim Akers, Robber's Roost, 2011:  fine wine.

Back from the desert

 Bei playing with fire in the San Rafael Swell.

(Click any photo for larger view)

The weather in Southern Utah treated us well during our spring break last week, and then we returned to Laramie to find 65 degree sunshine--almost unheard of in mid-March and just a little ominous in a climate change sort of way.  I'm reluctantly back at work with lots to do before I can write a proper blog post about the trip, but here are a few photos.  We spent a night in the San Rafael Swell on our way south and walked the loop up Wild Horse Canyon and down Bell Canyon, about 8 miles altogether of fun narrows and easy hiking.  Then we spent the bulk of our week backpacking in and out of Silver Falls Creek Canyon to the Escalante River, with a day hike up Harris wash on the other side of the river (the river crossing is easy and shallow...but cold!).  

Silver Falls is not the most exquisite Escalante canyon I've walked through, but it was nice, and Harris Wash was spectacular.  New and unusual for me was Ellen and Bei's sighting of 2 bighorn sheep near the river.  I've seen them in the mountains but never in the desert.  They watched us with mild interest as we jockeyed for a better viewpoint from the slabs below.  I also found an old bourbon bottle eroding out of the bank of Silver Falls Creek near an abandoned corral.  It was empty.  

Silver Falls was a route used by Mormon settlers in the 1800s--they somehow pulled wagons through this canyon and Harris Wash to gain access to southern settlements like Bluff.  Along the canyon are names and dates hacked into the sandstone often with axes, which have a certain charm just by virtue of their history and age.  

OK--welcome back.  More later...

Little Wild Horse Canyon.  San Rafael Swell.

Bei in Silver Falls Creek Canyon, Escalante.

Bighorn sheep in Silver Falls Creek Canyon, near the Escalante River.

Dusk on our last night in Silver Falls Creek, Escalante.