IntrepidXJ's Adventure Blog

Friday, April 9, 2010 | Day 2

After a cool night in Lake Canyon we were up early and broke down camp. Before heading out, Jared and I went for a hike up Lake Canyon to warm up. When we made it back to camp, we headed back out of Lake Canyon and headed towards the Nokai Dome shortcut which would take us to the Halftrack Junction.

Passed this along the way

Stopped at Halftrack Junction

When we reached the junction, we made contact with the rest of the group who were headed up the trail behind us. We continued on, knowing they would catch us soon enough.

and they did…

However, shortly after joining the rest of the group, our small group left the main group again and headed the other direction. We went down the old trail and back to the washed out section in Lake Canyon for a different perspective.

The washout in Lake Canyon from above

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Thursday, April 8, 2010 | Day 1

Late last year I finally decided to put together a trip that has been on my to-do list for way too long. I needed to finish driving the Hole-in-the-Rock Expedition (San Juan Mission) Route by driving the Hole-in-the-Rock Trail. I had driven pretty much all of the other sections of the route that are drivable except for this one. This was planned as a three day trip so that we could take our time and also get in some hiking along the trail. My adventure started on Thursday, which was the day before we were supposed to meet at the trail. I wanted to take my time driving to the trail near Hall’s Crossing and also make a few stops along the way.

After stopping at Back of Beyond Books in Moab and filling up my gas tank in Blanding, I set off west on UT-95. Of course I had to stop at ‘Salvation Knoll’ since it was an important landmark to George Hobbs and the Hole-in-the-Rock Expedition.

From Salvation Knoll I made my way further west to my first trail of the trip. On my maps, I noticed there was a segment of the Hole-in-the-Rock trail that I had not driven that connected UT-95 and UT-276. After some research into the route, I found that it is still a valid route that is open to motorized travel, so I figured I would give it a try.

When I reached the turnoff from the highway, I was greeted with a well maintained county road. The sign even marked it as part of the Mormon Trail

After a mile or two of the easy pretty well maintained road, it got a little rougher and crossed some slickrock sections

Eventually I reached a large section of slickrock that dropped off into a small canyon. I didn’t immediately find a way down, so I parked the Jeep and hiked around for a while until I picked up the trail again. From this point on, the well maintained county road was left behind and the much rougher and narrower trail continued. It was hard to follow in many places and required that I hike ahead first, but there were enough signs along the way to reassure myself that I was on the right track.

Marker along the route indicating this was part of the Hole-in-the-Rock Expedition

Dropping down

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For Easter, Amanda and I spent our day exploring some new trails east of Moab that we had not been on before. Our first destination was the short but very scenic South Fork of Sevenmile Canyon.

Much of this trail was in a sandy wash

The further up the canyon we went, the rockier and narrower the trail got

This was a dead end trail, so once we reached the end we turned around and headed for our next destination, which would be the Taylor Rim trail.

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On Saturday morning, Amanda and I headed out to the Dome Plateau area north of Moab in search of some arches. The main arch I wanted to find was Covert Arch above Lost Spring Canyon. I figured since we were planning on looking for at least one arch, I should stop by as many as I could find throughout the day and get some photos.

Our first destination for the day would be Covert Arch, so I got off the interstate and took the Yellow Cat Road to the Dome Plateau Road, across The Highlands, and then made our way out on Winter Camp Ridge. When we drove as close as we could to the arch, we began our 1.5 mile hike to find the arch.

Views down into Lost Spring Canyon were very cool.

We followed the canyon rim for a ways and then trekked across a sandy area.

Shadow on the sand

Lots of sand. Luckily it was still moist, so walking across it was pretty easy.

Then we finally found Covert Arch.

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After work I decided to head out on my first mountain bike ride of the season. I ended up heading to the Spanish Trail and Gunnison Bluffs area and rode one of the loops. Here’s a few photos from my ride…

At the trailhead with my new, but temporary bike rack. The spare tire bike rack I had on my XJ would not fit on the JK.

Gunnison River below

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