Trail Pictures

Spring Desert

Tracy

Smith Fork

Tracy @ Smith Fork

Tumbleweeds

Tumbleweeds

Tumbleweeds

Smith Fork

Smith Fork

Side slot

Slickrock

Slickrock

Slickrock

Tracy on Slickrock

Slickrock

Slickrock

Bridge

Bridge

Smith Fork

Smith Fork

Smith Fork

Smith Fork

Stars

Laser

Tracy @ Burr Point

Tracy @ Burr Point

Tracy @ Burr Point

Tracy @ Burr Point

Tracy @ Burr Point

Dirty Devil

Dirty Devil

Dirty Devil

Dirty Devil

Dirty Devil

Dirty Devil

Private Mars research

Private Mars research

Private Mars research

Blue Hills

Blue Hills

Blue Hills

Blue Hills

Blue Hills

Blue Hills

Smith Fork Canyon

        Utah Area Trails S. Utah with Cory Lake Powell 2011 The Needles The Maze E Fork Burnt Fork Leidy Peak Burnt Fork Granite Highline Causey May 11 Green River Buck Canyon Antelope Apr 11 Smith Fork Grizzly Ridge Yurt Moab Arches Bear River Moab Flight Snowbasin Art Nord Moab Rim Zion Dry Fork Naturalist Basin Timpanogos Cave Meteor Shower Yellowstone Creek McCoy Park Ostler Creek Granddaddy Causey Southern Utah Coyote Gulch White Canyon - Moqui Canyon Tetons - Cabin Southern Utah Wildhorse Canyon Snowbasin Great Salt Lake Snowbasin Robber's Roost Deep Creeks Farmington Canyon Nine Mile Canyon Fish Lake - McCoy Park Harris Wash Antelope Island Moab Southern Utah Log Hollow Moab Lake Powell Wasatch Buckskin Gulch Deseret Peak Pine Valley Logan Canyon Causey Reservoir China Meadows Haystack Lake Cow Park Highline Grandaddy Lakes Amethyst Basin Uintas Cat Canyon Southern Utah Southern Utah Glen Canyon Swett Canyon Antelope Island Uintas - Yurt Pebble Creek Robbers Roost Antelope/ Lost Creek N Fork Provo River Capitol Reef Pine Valley Wilderness Uintas Stillwater Reservoir Grandaddy Mountain Logan Canyon Canyonlands Arches Twin Lakes Kabell Lake Amethyst Basin South Cedar Ridge Canyon Hurricane Wash Middle Fork of the Ogden River Moab Cat Canyon Crack Canyon Causey Reservoir St George Log Hollow Canyonlands Steam Mill Canyon Row Bench Rubies Highline Causey Reservoir Flat Tops Grand Daddy Lake Antelope Island White Pine Lake Brown Duck Flaming Gorge Snowbasin Swasey Lakes Spooky Gulch White Rock Bay Grand Gulch Cat Canyon Moon Lake Antelope Island Antelope Island Long Park Grand Daddy Lake Hades Pass Tom's Canyon Just arrived

The weekend of 4 Mar 11, we drove out towards Bullfrog, UT, to find some areas of slickrock

around Lake Powell that we had seen back in January when we took our flight over southern

Utah.  We had driven out to the area that same weekend, but we didn't have time to hike down

into it, so this weekend we wanted to get down in it.  The basic plan, since this was just

exploration, was to drive the 4x4 roads outside of Ticaboo, and then try to find a way to get

down into the slickrock that looked to be surrounding a canyon.  We ended up getting pretty

close, and then hiking across the desert to drop into Smith Fork Canyon (Yahoo Maps).  We

might could have kept driving down that road a little further to get closer, but we didn't know

that at the time, so we just headed out across the desert to a small side canyon.  We had to do

some easy down climbing to get into the main canyon, but it was't any problem.  Once down in

Smith Fork, we turned towards Lake Powell and just started down the canyon.  We were here

to look for slickrock playgrounds, but the canyon itself turned out to be pretty nice.  In narrowed

up pretty nicely, and got deep, so we really enjoyed it.  It also got choked in several places with

tumbleweeds, which Tracy didn't enjoy getting stuck by at all.  We ran into one big rock fall that

took some navigating to climb down, but it wasn't too bad, either.

We eventually came up on a very nice, short side canyon slot.  We headed up this and were

able to climb out onto the slickrock from there.  The slickrock was really nice, and we hiked

around on it for a while, but it was interesting to see that it wasn't nearly as flat as it had

appeared from the air or the overlook!  But after hiking around some, we dropped back into the

slot and then back to the main canyon.  I did try my new camera out to take some video of the

slot.  Of course, right after taking the video, I realized the camera was acting up, and some of

the buttons weren't working correctly, so I had to return it after we got home.

But we continued down canyon, until we hit a small pool.  It wasn't very long, but it was deep,

and it was full of deep mud.  Unfortunately, we didn't feel like dealing with that, so we figured

we would turn around.  But then Tracy started throwing small rocks into the puddle, and she

couldn't stop.  But no matter how many rocks she threw, they just sunk into the mud.  After

about 15 minutes, seeing that she wouldn't stop trying to build her "bridge," I started tp help by

putting out big rocks.  By the time we were done, after about 30 minutes, we had a bridge

across the pool.  I know, we're weird...but you have to blame Tracy for this one!

So we conituned down canyon.  We reached our 3 pm turn-around time just when we reached

the old level of Lake Powell.  Of course, the lake isn't that high anymore, so we couldn't see the

lake, but it was the turn-around time, so we started to head back.  After a couple of minutes,

we came on a side wash that looked like we might have a chance to use it to climb out of the

canyon.  We hiked up the wash and then onto the slickrock, only to get cliffed up.  So we

backtracked and tried to go around another dome.  This proved better, and we were able to

get a good ways out of the canyon on the slickrock.  But then we hit the cliff band.  The cliff

band encircled the canyon at the edge of the desert floor, and there didn't appear to be any

way out of it.  We hiked to the back of dead-end, but we didn't see any way out, so we started

hiking back towards the canyon, figuring we were just going to have to backtrack out.  But

about half-way down the cliff band we found a spot where it looked like it might be possible to

climb out.  After a bit of scrambling, we were actually able to make it out onto the desert floor.

I'm still not sure how we got lucky enough to find the spot, but it was awfully nice to find it!  I

didn't have any trouble climbing it, but Tracy got a little spooked at the top, and I had to drag

her up...now she needs new hiking pants!

Then we just hiked cross-country about 2.5 miles to get back to the truck.  Tracy used her

fancy new rare earth magnets to look for meteorites, and she immediately realized that every

rock she touched them to was metallic.  We don't know...we figure we found a lot of iron

deposits.  But we had an uneventful walk out after finding a 4x4 road that go us back to the

truck.

We camped that night at Burr Point, overlooking the Green River, and the next day we did

some driving down Poison Spring Canyon and then out into the Blue Hills outside of Hanksville.

This was a great weekend, as we got to explore a canyon that we didn't know anything about,

which was a whole lot of fun.