(Part One)
I drove north towards Capitol Reef National Park under clear skies. Once I got off the Interstate the highway climbed quite a bit and for a while there I could see snow all around me. Apparently Utah had a wet winter, just like California.
Utah’s high country reminded me a lot of Colorado and I enjoyed the drive. As an added plus, traffic was pretty light.
When I stopped in the town of Loa for gas, the sky was overcast and the temperature on the bank sign read 46o. Brrrr! I was wearing pants but I quickly added a jacket. Loa is just up the road from the Capitol Reef’s visitor center. When I arrived there, I stepped out of the truck, bracing myself for the cold….
And almost spontaneously combusted. The hand-drawn weather board outside the Visitor’s Center called for sunny skies and an expected high of 62 degrees.
Well, shit. I shed my jacket and rolled up my pants as I stood in line for information. I was just going to buy an annual pass and move along, but I heard the guy in front of me asking about slot canyons and that got my attention. So when it was my turn I asked the lady “so, about the slot canyons…” and her eyes lit up.
She handed me a leaflet with three (!) slot canyon hikes. They all originated outside the park, on BLM land.
BLM land. You know, the land of free camping.
“There are sites within a mile of each of the slot canyon trailheads,” she said. “When you camp, just stay off the pavement and you’re good.”
Hot diggity!
Armed with my annual pass, a rough map of the slot canyons (they all start in sandy, dry washes and all the trailheads are well marked), I made my way to the scenic drive.
Along the way I stopped at the Grand Wash.
This was the hike I wanted to do when Michael and I were here last, in 2016. And it was awesome. The Grand Wash might not be the narrowest or have the tallest rock walls, but it’s an easy hike with lovely views. Views I’d been missing! I took a few pictures but really, I was so happy to be back among the red rock formations that I just enjoyed my hike. I was in heaven. I was also in shorts and a tank top.
I love Capitol Reef.
After my hike I headed east, out of the park, and turned south on to Notom Road. There are three slot canyons with trailheads on Notom Road: Burro Wash, Cottonwood Wash, and Sheets Gulch. Apparently people were getting the farthest (about 5 miles in) on Sheets Gulch. But in looking over my rudimentary map I saw that this trail began with a 2-mile hike through a dry wash before entering into the slot canyon.
Washes aren’t bad places to hike. They’re just kind of… boring. Especially by comparison. Overall Cottonwood Wash was a shorter hike – it ends at a 35-foot rock wall after just 3 miles. But the dry wash portion of the show was only supposed to last a mile.
Cottonwood Canyon it was. Would be. Now it was already 6:30pm and daylight was starting to fade. Time to find a place to camp.
At first I wasn’t too sure about my spot. I was off a BLM road and it was clearly a campsite. But there was a fenced-property with cows and two houses close by. How close? One of the houses was just visible from when I parked. I could hear music for a while there; somebody was clearly at home. Would that somebody bother me in the middle of the night? I worried about it.
I’ve been told that I worry too much about nothing. The sun was almost gone and other than being close to a residence, the site was quite nice – flat and, since it sat in between two low ridges, completely out of the wind. I ate one of my sandwiches for dinner and watched the sky get darker. When the cold set in I called it a night.
Snuggled into my sleeping bag I couldn’t help but be so glad of my decision to come up here.