End of the Death March

April 9, Day 8
The day started as I have long anticipated - woken by a chorus of songs by a bunch of coyotes, at least one very nearby. Far from being premature in my previous rant, I am now in Canyonlands National Park. I picked up supplies yesterday, as well as a participant for the section, Ron Thomas, a fellow Moabite who wants to see a bit deeper into his own backyard. After devouring a great lunch prepared by Ron’s wife Annie, we hoisted packs with eight days of food, two and a half days of water, snowshoes (really!), and began section three of the HT.




This park is incredible; huge, diverse, eye-opening, jaw-dropping scenery and geology greet you around every turn. It could be a massive pour-off (a waterfall in the canyon floor), a massive canyon to follow, like Cyclone Canyon today, part of the system of “graben” canyons (a graben canyon basically has had the walls pull apart from each other). If those don’t do it for you maybe the colorful and wild rock formations will. Red and white layers, with rippled strata create “mushrooms” hundreds of feet tall, spires and towers of equal stature abound, with yet other layers revealing fossilized remains of ancient sea beds.




Opting for a slightly different route though the Needles District, we decided to head up Red Lake Canyon, where the Hayduke Trail goes down. We added quite a few miles and a huge amount of vertical as we passed through the district’s namesake feature; the Needles, and then the magical Chesler Park. The pass we took thru the Needles was accessed via Devil’s Pocket, and when we hit the pass, so did the cold front, just from opposite sides. Snow was going sideways, winds were roaring through the rocks, and thunder began clapping as the temperature plummeted. That’s a hint as to why we have snowshoes in one of N. America’s driest desert. There’s been a lot of snow this season, and over the next few days we’ll be heading to over 7000’ elevation and quite possibly a significant snowpack. I like to say it’s better to have something and not need it than to need it and not have it, though that can get tricky when you’re carrying everything you may or may not need on your back. After the experience I had with Mitch at the beginning of our 101-day trek in 2000, I decided to go with the shoes.




April 10, Day 9
Woke to the sound of snow sloughing off the tent; here we go was all I could think, the going just got tougher. Waking up when it got light out revealed a quickly melting inch of snow; I was encouraged by the thought of potholes having water in them. We headed up Butler Wash towards Beef Basin after things dried out. Butler Wash is interesting, going from sandy bottom out in sage covered meadows to deep within wildly colored canyon walls. We explored more than we hoped to, mistaking a side canyon for the main drainage for a period. Realizing that things didn’t match the map anymore, we turned around, grabbing a gallon of water from a plunge pool, just in case we really bungled badly, and had to retreat to Canyonlands (losing a day on the schedule we have would prevent us from getting to Hite, the end of the section, on time).




April 13, Day 12
Exhausted is the feeling (again), huge are the surroundings (again). We left Fable Valley and headed up the side canyon; lots of water, a couple major pour-offs, and the surprise—fresh bear tracks! Lots of those! We even figured it was in our best interest to leave the old bruin behind, climbing to the rim of the canyon. The first thing we see up top: more bear tracks! Top is the Dark Canyon Plateau, and fortunately, the snow was only spotty; no need for the snowshoes. Ron and I also saw a fellow gathering antler sheds. We heard his cohort tooling all over the place on an ATV. Finding out this member of the San Juan County road department apparently didn’t feel obligated to stay on his own roads.




We easily found Young’s Canyon after coming over the plateau a short distance. As I usually try to do, we followed a fair amount of game trails, skirting meanders and pour-offs. One proved enormously beneficial; it lead us almost to the top, just up-canyon from where we had to find a route out anyway. We then followed the canyon rim around to the psycho descent back down to the canyon floor, which like others on the journey, has plenty of water flowing in it.




April 15, day 14
Dark Canyon was different than the last time I was through here in 1998. First, we saw people down in the canyon, last time we went ten days through the area without seeing anyone at all. The canyon was still beautiful, in fact we found some “ruins” that we neglected to stumble upon on my first pass. The floor was just as amazing; lined with fossils, the walls of the canyon just as big, we even saw a California Condor soaring in an updraft.




The big difference this time though, is the water. No longer the delightful clear creek I remembered, this time the water was a raging reddish mud that brought a feeling of dread to me when we first realized the volume that was coursing through the canyon, in a drainage that would have to be crossed numerous times. Coming out of Young’s, we made a test crossing and found it doable. Good thing; there weren’t many options to continuing on the way we planned. Deciding that conditions were within our margin of risk, we pushed on towards the Sundance Trail, our exit point for the morning. Knowing there were at least a couple of groups in the canyon (we saw their footprints, something we hadn’t been seeing much of on the rest of the section), we camped just shy of the climb. This morning, we were less than thrilled to find the volume perhaps double what it was yesterday. We still had to cross three more times too. We got to do those at yesterday’s peak melt, which was just making it down to our area, so it also happened to be even icier than yesterday.




The last crossing almost was my last—period. Trying to cross in the wider, and therefore, shallower and slower sections, I stumbled into a chest deep pool, and there’s no way to keep footing in that deep water with that kind of flow. Ron grabbed my pole and pulled me to the edge. Just one hazard of many, compounded by my upcoming solitary travels, following an itinerary with no margin. The idea I’d been toying around with was now a decision; this journey was going to change.




April 18
Greetings from Moab! After completing the first three sections of the Hayduke Trail and almost 150 miles, I’ve decided to approach things slightly differently. As I worked to keep the trip together after Mitch’s “cancellation,” I strived to end the journey around the same time as originally planned, as I need to get back to work so I can keep my new home (besides the fact that it gets hot in the desert in the summer!!). I lost quite a bit of travel time as I rearranged the itinerary, got permits, and placed caches. That has left a very aggressive schedule on the trail, one that is physically possible, but didn’t allow for much exploration time. I want to enjoy this journey, and I want to see where I’m passing through. Both Ron and I were miffed at the discovery of a possibly untouched archeological site, yet we didn’t have the extra couple of hours we needed to climb to it.




The schedule is that tight. Besides, this isn’t supposed to be a death march, it’s supposed to be a reward for the time put into researching such a cross-country route as the Hayduke Trail.

So instead of having a resupply at Hite with our wives as planned, where Ron was also leaving, I opted to head back to Moab and recalibrate the trek. (I’ve since been alerted to an experienced long distance hiker who began the HT with a 12 mile per day plan who has already found that pace to be impossible to maintain).




Am I giving up? NO WAY! My concession is that I am going to have to eliminate a couple of sections and use the time originally allotted for those sections to extend the time I’m on the sections that I’ll still travel.

I guess that’s going to leave bragging rights for the first end-to-end Hayduke Trail expedition open...Hope you enjoyed these photos I managed to send along of the Canyonlands.

Once again, next communication will be from the Hayduke Trail!

Keep it Wild,
Mike Coronella