Meeting the Llamas

 So my nephew got some llamas and we just had to go over and take a look. After all, it's not every day that you get to see a llama (unless you own one, I guess).

We got a little distracted by the lamb that was wandering around. I have a feeling one of those will be in our not-too-distant future.

Then it was time to inspect the llamas. Desert Girl was the bravest.

The white one was just as curious about her as she was about it.

What a great expression!

Finally Desert Boy had a chance to look up close.

Um, maybe you don't want to get that close--llamas can spit! (Fortunately these didn't.)

This is a family of llamas, mom, dad, and two daughters. My nephew is hoping to use them as pack animals, as apparently the larger ones can carry a hundred pounds. When I looked up llamas on Wikipedia, I learned that they are a domesticated camelid from South America, raised for their meat and as pack animals. Since the 1980s they also have been used as predator control for sheep and have been very successful. They usually live 15-25 years and have an 11.5 month gestation period. It will be interesting to watch them develop.

A Visit to Big Warm Spring, Duckwater Shoshone Reservation

 The kids had an extra day off of school due to teacher training, so I decided we should go somewhere fun for the day. We decided on Big Warm Spring on the Duckwater Shoshone Reservation. The spring is shown in the new Great Basin National Park movie and looked gorgeous. We didn't exactly get an early start, but the plus side of that was we got to eat lunch at Twin Wok in Ely, which is a special treat. Then we headed west on Highway 6. At the old bar in Currant (don't blink or you'll miss it), we turned north to head up Railroad Valley.

This is what the road looked like:

It might look boring, but I was fascinated seeing the ranches and geology. In 20 miles the pavement ended and we went a quarter mile on a dirt road before veering to the left towards these trees and a fence. There we saw a sign identifying the location as the Duckwater Shoshone Reservation Big Warm Spring. I especially appreciated that they stated, "Water is Sacred." The Duckwater Shoshone allow the general public to visit the spring, as long as they abide by the rules.

A little closer to the spring are some interpretive signs, mainly about the native Railroad Valley springfish (Crenichthys nevadae), which has survived for thousands of years after Lake Railroad dried up. They are listed as threatened by the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and a host of partners have worked to keep these little fish surviving.

Then it was time to get into Nevada's largest geothermal hot spring. Did you know that Nevada not only has the most mountain ranges of any state (over 300) but also the most hot springs (also over 300)? It's also the driest state in the country, so those hot springs are extra special. Big Warm Spring is about 91-93 degrees Fahrenheit, so warmer than the average swimming pool but cooler than a hot tub. In other words, perfect for just enjoying.

A stairway leads into the spring, and those handrails are helpful as you tread the algae-covered steps. That algae is important, it's one of the main food sources for the Railroad Valley springfish, but it's also slippery.

The water is extremely clear, but at the bottom the sediment is very fine. There's a sulfur smell to the water, a reminder that this spring exists because of heat deep within the earth and the plumbing that is taking this water by that heat.

Not so long ago, the spring faced some hard times, and in 2007 the US Fish and Wildlife Service and the Duckwater Shoshone tribe signed a Safe Harbor Agreement to protect the fish and restore the spring. The joint effort led to digging out the pond, placing boulders around it, removing non-native catfish, reintroducing the native springfish, fencing around the springs, and some new diversion structures. (This Safe Harbor Agreement has lots of great information about the spring and area, so is well worth reading.)

We took a little walk to view more of the spring channel. I liked seeing the milkweed, host to monarch butterfly caterpillars.

We could see additional places where water was bubbling up from the bottom, adding to the flow.

A viewing platform was a little farther down.

I also went and checked out the USGS stream gauge. The spring channel is pretty consistently 14-15 cfs year round.

After I returned home I found out if we had continued downstream we would have reached a waterfall. I guess we'll have to go back!

We went back to the springhead and swam. One man came to look for a lost item and graciously took a photo of us. The water is up to about 10 feet deep in places, so I was glad Desert Girl had her life jacket on. Desert Boy has gotten good enough at swimming he was fine without one.

We even took some time for a little swim lesson practice, trying to get his front crawl ready for an upcoming triathlon.

I imagine most weekends are quite busy here, but we were visiting on a weekday when area schools were in session. It made for a very relaxing afternoon. This is truly a special place, and I hope to visit again.

A Quick Jaunt through Peekaboo and Spooky Canyons

 Before I left Escalante, I wanted to check out Peekaboo and Spooky Canyons. These are short, family-friendly non-technical slot canyons. I had wanted to visit them with my family in May, but the abundant rain prevented that. Fortunately, my last day in Grand Staircase-Escalante dawned with nary a storm cloud in the sky. I slept in, which is quite a feat as I was sleeping in the bed of the pickup truck. However, I've found if I wear a little eye cover, I get much better sleep as it blocks out the light of the moon and even the light of the sun!

I had a leisurely start as I drove down Hole-in-the-Rock Road to the Dry Fork Trailhead, 26 miles south of Highway 12. The information I had read said it was passable to passenger vehicles, but I found the Hole-in-the-Rock Road to be quite rough, with lots of washboards and some sandy spots. I did see one passenger car, but everything else was SUVs with a few pickups thrown in. The Dry Fork trailhead road was very rough, with a two-track to the trailhead. When I arrived, two other vehicles were there. I got together my gear (not forgetting knee pads this time, even though these were short canyons), and reread my guidebook. It said you could see the entrance to Peekaboo Canyon from the trailhead, behind the sheer cliff wall. Sure enough, I saw a slot. I took off on the well-marked trail, following the rock cairns.

For those who aren't used to hiking on rock and steering by rock cairns, just the hike down to the canyon start will be an adventure.

Before too long I arrived in the Dry Fork Wash and sauntered (it was kind of hot, so I wasn't exactly trotting) up to the start of Peekaboo Canyon. It was about 9:30 am, and no one else was around. I saw that the entrance required a little bit of climbing, although steps carved into the rock made it a little too easy.

Not far up the canyon I saw the promised double arch.

It was indeed gorgeous.

The canyon twisted and turned, sometimes with taller walls and sometimes with shorter walls. There were a couple little climbs that would be difficult for kids (or shall we say they would be good team-building experiences). And then I came out of the narrow section. Here's the view looking back down the canyon:

Peekaboo comes out into a shallow wash with a prominent cairn on the south side. You can apparently make a much longer loop if you bring rope and rappelling gear with you, but I was just into the short trip today. I started following the rock cairns and sandy trails, not really sure what I was aiming for.

In about 15 minutes I came to this huge sandy wash. This had to be Spooky Canyon. It looked like a big watershed, so not the best place to be in a thunderstorm, when lots of water would be funneled down the wash.

The canyon quickly narrowed, and I was hot and thirsty, so I found a very scenic shady spot and sat down for a break. It was so enjoyable just relaxing in the canyon all by myself. I had been expecting lots more people.

Spooky gets kind of narrow. As in you can't wear a pack and have to turn your body sideways narrow.

The walls are gorgeous, undulating sandstone.

After a climbdown through some boulders and more squirming through even tighter passage, I emerged and headed right (north) back into the Dry Fork Wash. The walls were higher, providing some pleasant shade. If I had had more time, I could have gone down canyon 30 minutes to explore Brimstone Canyon, but I felt home calling me, so I headed in the direction of the trailhead.

When I reached the entrance of Peekaboo, I saw people. A German family was trying to haul their tripod up the Peekaboo entrance with a rope, a couple was approaching, and another couple was heading down Dry Fork, probably trying to avoid the traffic jam.

Very close to Peekaboo I saw a canyon entrance and spent a few minutes enjoying the wider passageway. This is part of Dry Fork Wash, a very scenic part.

I hiked back up to the trailhead, making my journey in about 2 1/4 hours. The usual time recommended is 2.5-4.5, which seems accurate if you're with others and spending more time to enjoy the sights (or waiting for others to squeeze through the narrows and do the climbs). With the kids, I would say 4 hours would be about right. For a few more details about this hike, check out this website.

Peekaboo and Spooky are a really great intro to canyoneering, but getting there is a little more difficult than I expected. Nevertheless, for those who have never done canyoneering, this will be a hike to remember!

Neon Canyon

 On our Escalante canyoneering trip, we originally were going to do Neon Canyon as part of a backpacking trip, but due to the bad roads we had to switch our plans and do Neon Canyon as a day trip (Excursions of Escalante offers this as a four-day trip and Zion Adventure Company offers a three-day trip).

We had to hike three miles cross-country to the Escalante River, cross the river, then hike up above the canyon, drop into the canyon and navigate it, then hike the three miles back to the trailhead. The hike looked daunting as we saw our landmark butte out in the distance.

Far distance.

It looked really far away.

Yikes, it was far!

Normally three miles doesn't sound far, but when you can see the whole three miles laid out right in front of you, it looks far. (Can you spot the person in the bottom third of the photo? He's already tiny and not so far away.)

Nevertheless, we started hiking. Hiking on the rock wasn't so tough, but there were a lot of sandy sections. We tried to stay off the cryptobiotic soil, the soil that is held together by lichens (which themselves are a combination of fungi and algae). The cryptobiotic soil keeps the soil in place and can be hundreds or even thousands of years old.

We started hiking in Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument and crossed an unmarked boundary into Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. Eventually we got to where we could see the green swath of the Escalante River. What a welcoming sight! As we got close to our butte, we could see the canyon below it, meeting up with the Escalante.

The Escalante River wasn't quite what I expected. The entire streambed is really wide, and we first crossed a dry section of it. We could hear water, so we knew the stream was close, and after bushwhacking through willows reached it. The water was running fast and brown from the recent rains, and was over knee high crossing it. Small branches floated down, and I felt the river trying to push me over as I crossed. But that wasn't enough to prevent a few of us taking a small trail upstream and jumping in and floating to the canyon entrance. It felt great to cool off!

We ate an early lunch and then started up the canyon, quickly hiking out of the canyon bottom. The view up canyon was spectacular. We followed a well-marked trail past the first possible drop-in place. At the second (the "more fun entrance"), we decided it was time to go into the canyon. It's possible to go much farther up canyon before dropping in, but the most spectacular part is the bottom part and we were doing a daytrip, so we decided this was a good place for us. Plus it was hot, and we were eager to get into the shade of the canyon.

After a quick rappel into a side canyon we entered the main canyon, which was only a few feet wide. A swimmer hole soon followed, and about half the group put on wetsuits. The rest of us were so hot from hiking we decided to give the pools a try in just our shorts and t-shirts.

We had a lot of swimming to do! Or at least backfloating--a backpack with drybags inside makes a nice buoyant container for keeping one high in the water.

After many twists and turns we came out to a section with trees and took a snack break. This is where "the normal" entrance comes in. There are supposed to be moqui steps (steps made by Native Americans in the rock), but I missed them.

We weren't thrilled to see the big, puffy dark clouds overhead, but fortunately we didn't hear any thunder. Nevertheless, we were all aware that the canyon could flash at any time. A storm in the upper reaches, miles from us, could send water swooshing down the narrow canyons. We frequently saw flood debris over our heads.

The next section we would enter was renowned for a couple keeper potholes. These are potholes that have the downstream side higher than you can usually reach, so you have to do shoulder stands or pack tosses or even use a grappling hook to get out. We all put on wetsuits now, anticipating we might be in the water awhile as we did some problem solving.

But the water was so high, that we swam right over the potholes. Our exits were generally easy, like stepping onto a sandy beach.

We went right over what is usually another keeper pothole and then got ready for the final rappel--into the magical Golden Cathedral. Thanks to Bryan for catching this photo of me.

The light was gorgeous, and we felt very lucky to be there. We were fortunate that the weather cooperated. Here's a video of a flash flood in the Golden Cathedral.

Wet and happy!

Many thanks to Bryan for organizing this trip.

I really didn't want to get out of the water, so I floated back over and took a photo of the drop looking up. It looked a little like a face. 

And here's a photo of Pauli coming down.

Once we had stripped off our wetsuits and had another snack, it was time to start the long hike back. It went smoothly, though, and we were back at the vehicle faster than we expected. All in all, a fantastic day! I could understand why Neon and the Golden Cathedral get a lot of hype, they are definitely gorgeous.