As a winter sport enthusiast, it takes a lot to convince me to do an overnighter without traveling over snow. Sliding skis is easy on the joints, efficient and light on the environment. So it took me some twenty plus years to finally organize a trip to hike Buckskin Gulch, the Paria Canyon über classic on the Utah/Arizona border. During my procrastination, Congress designated Paria Canyon, Vermillion Cliffs and Coyote Buttes, wilderness area protection status. Good reasons too as those areas are amazing pieces of real estate.
We divide our planning into three areas: logistics, gear and the hike. Organizing for this trip was pretty straight forward but there are a few tips in each area that could make your trip a bit more enjoyable.
The LogisticsAfter some discussion on how to approach the hike, either run and gun (one day) or light and fast (day and a half), we settled on light and fast. Why rush? Going through such a wondrous area for the first time at a more leisurely pace, gives us more time for photographs. So we prepared to overnight somewhere outside of the actual gulch.
For you not familiar with narrow desert canyons or slot canyons, one must be mindful of the weather. In a tight canyon like Buckskin, there are places where the opposite walls get as close as two feet. In the event of a flash flood were rainwater runoff channels down a canyon with walls up to 500 vertical feet, chances of escape and survival are slim to none—the ultimate swirly. If thunderstorm activity has or will occur within a 50 mile radius, don’t camp down there.
The Bureau of Land Management has set-up a permit system to control access to this world famous canyoning adventure (2B V using the Canyon Rating System). You can get your permit online up to four months in advance at five dollars per day per person (overnight is two days) or a day permit for $6 (
https://www.blm.gov/az/paria/index.cfm?usearea=PC). Up to ten permits are also issued daily on a first-come first serve basis at the BLM field offices one day before departure. I applied for my permit online and it arrived by mail the same week. It comes with a neat information package on everything you need to know including flash flood prediction resources.
When we arrived in Kanab, Utah, we went to the Kanab BLM Field Office to pick up our little aluminized pouches. These pouches are the BLM’s way of dealing with the human waste problem that has grown with increased traffic in the Gulch. They work fine since you are not exposed to much sun or drastic changes in atmospheric pressure, unlike what we experienced climbing on Mt Shasta. The bags would inflate in the sun and while descending, forcing the seals open and…off-gas. Nasty, but we try to do our part. FYI, it also helps to start at the trailhead with empty bowels.
Another item we picked up at the BLM field office was a Hiker’s Guide to Paria Canyon. This guide is a clever, waterproofed, roadmap-sized flip pamphlet the BLM publishes and can be purchased for eight very well spent dollars. This guide provides you most all the information needed to plan your trip as well as detailed maps for Paria Canyon, Buckskin Gulch and Wire Pass.
Logistically, one more arrangement needs to be made—a shuttle of some kind. Since our trip is a point-to-point hike, we need a shuttle to pick us up at the White House Trailhead exit point (where you leave your car) and be taken to our start about eleven miles (19 Km) away at Buckskin Gulch Trailhead. There are at least three or four different companies that provide shuttle service for $50 to $75 in the Kanab Utah/Page Arizona area. Alternatively, you can chain your mountain bike(s) to a stout tree at the White House Trailhead and ride back to your car at the end of the hike. With the money you save from the shuttle, you can use it to have someone massage your legs after that very long day!
The Gear and PhotographyIn the spirit of light and fast, we had some new gear to try. We also came away with a new perspective on the limits of our photographic gear. First, let's look at the light and fast gear.
For Sandra, it was Osprey’s new Exos 56 backpack. This 56 liter top loader with its Air Speed Suspension mesh back panel was just the ticket for our potentially hot trek through the desert (
http://www.ospreypacks.com/). You can tell a lot of thought went into the details of this pack. For instance, when Sandra would take a picture, she would hand me her trekking poles, lean them against a wall, or do anything that would keep them out of the muck. The Exos has a little shock cord loop on the bottom of the left shoulder strap that secures your trekking poles for situations just like ours.
Carrying enough water in this canyon was a big concern for us but the Exos had plenty of solutions. Besides the hydration bladder compartment and ports, access to additional water bottles is plentiful through a variety of secure external mesh pockets. This super lightweight, thoughtfully conceived and great carrying backpack is made with recycled PET material (recycled plastic bottles), making our footprints through Buckskin even lighter.
I was able to test a pair of e.n.d.’s new Stumptown 12 oz (that is the model name of the shoes). e.n.d. calls it a multi-tool for your feet. I had already run over a hundred miles on trails and roads in these shoes yet the folks at e.n.d. assured me hiking in them would be ok. During the hike, a major advantage of this shoe emerged--its Seamsmart nylon upper. Wading through pools lined with nine-inch deep liquid mud swathed on our shoes with cocoa-tinted slime. If I had worn any mesh trail shoe, mud would have stuck to it and permeated the mesh. With gaiters and e.n.d.’s non-mesh uppers, I was able to emerge from the pools with the shoes fairly clean every time. That kept the weight down and the traction up as we would switch from wading to down climbing boulders. The biggest down climb in the canyon has a set of steps hacked into the sandstone which I was able to boulder (ground up), with the shoe’s regrind rubber soles sticking confidently (a reachy V0+ on the Hueco Scale). In all, I logged 25 miles on asphalt, mud pits, sandstone slabs and river bottom cobble with no blisters, slipping, bruised feet or stubbed toes. It’s nice not having to think about your gear’s performance (
http://www.endfootwear.com/).
One thing about traveling light and fast is it gives you more time to goof around--like taking pictures. In a group, you always have that one picture taker who loves to do it. When it’s just you or with another person, who wants to drag out the camera and disrupt the rhythm of the pace? Since we are traveling light, we can easily make up the time, right? Wrong! Every time we turned a corner, we saw astonishing formations and had to stop and gawk or take a pic.
Photography is a major activity in this canyon for obvious reasons. There are fantastic shapes, remarkable plays of light and a unique photographic environment to challenge the most proficient technician or artistic photographer. I came to the conclusion that this setting pushes photographic technology to the limit. Every photograph compromised some aspect of the composition due to the boundaries of the digital camera. White balance, low light noise and wide angle lens limitations became very apparent in capturing the nuances of the canyon. We white balanced every time with a gray or white card and used a tripod and the camera’s self-timer to take most of the shots. Still, we were stunned by the difference in what the camera recorded and what we saw. Bottom line, when you return from your trip, be prepared to spend time on the computer to color correct your images. One consolation I had with my prosumer camera was the ability to switch to video. There were places were a still image would not have done the scene justice. Next time we go to Buckskin Gulch, I’ll probably shoot high definition video to supplement the still imaging. On a practical note, I used the Ortlieb’s Aqua Zoom SLR waterproof camera case in the event we had to do some swimming.
The HikeAfter one last online check for the flash flood forecast, we loaded up the car and drove one hour from Kanab to our White House Trailhead shuttle meeting place. After no one showed up for one hour, we decided to drive ourselves to the Buckskin Gulch Trailhead instead of losing more time to the heat. We reasoned that other hikers might be finishing at the White House Trailhead the same time we would. So we should be able to bum a ride to House Rock Valley Road, the turn-off to Buckskin Gulch’s trailheads. Our 9:30 start from Buckskin Gulch Trailhead meant we would have to make up that hour and a half difference by putting the cameras away and keeping an eye on the watch, exactly what we did not want to do. From our trailhead to the camp sites north of the Paria River/Buckskin Gulch confluence is about sixteen miles. That is, sixteen miles of slow, mud and obstacle-filled, walking, wading up to thigh-deep water, scrambling, down climbing and photo op progress. The pressure was on, so off we went, taking pics along the way on this mid-70s (low 20’s C), high thin cloud, sunny day.
We decided to start from Buckskin Gulch Trailhead instead of the more popular Wire Pass Trailhead because we wanted to experience the entire Buckskin personality. Starting at Wire Pass shortens the overall length of the trip about three (5km) miles. Another reason why people start at the Wire Pass Trailhead is to save weight by carrying less water. The only filterable water in this canyon is found in the last half mile. Outside of that, I wouldn’t want to subject my water filter to ANY of the water in the Gulch. It’s basically water one step away from being mud.
From its flat sections at the start to the truly spectacular high walls at the Paria River confluence, we also wanted to see if the first four and a half miles were “boring” as posted on a couple of Buckskin online reports. I’d say you would have to be pretty jaded or have A.D.D. to call this part of the canyon uninteresting.
Buckskin Gulch, starting from the namesake’s trailhead, has distinctive beginning, middle and end characteristics. The beginning has you walking up a sandy wash, giving no hints of what is to come. Stratigraphically, you begin to see the Chinle or Moenave Formations, two of the seven major geographic formations exposed like an 85 million year old layer cake. At around three and a half miles, the canyon walls start to grow in fits and starts.
A mile later, the Wire Pass Trail intersects our path from the right (west) in a large area the size of a couple of football fields end-to-end. Here, signs of previous travelers, perhaps the Anasazi who lived in this area from 200 to 1200 AD, left petroglyphs marking their passage.
The petroglyphs are clearly seen at the very corner of this intersection on the Wire Pass side.
Continuing downstream, the slot canyon starts in earnest. We start to encounter lots of shallow pools and the walls of the canyon continued to get taller.
We were constantly reminded of the power of water by the way this land has been sculpted and the debris piled about from past flash floods. The sobering part of that discovery is looking 50 feet (15 meters) up to see, suspended overhead, log jams.
Up to mile thirteen, we regularly stopped to look at the scenery, take pictures, look for possible escape routes out of the canyon and imagine fantasy climbing routes. There will be a day when some industrious individuals start to scratch the surface of a lifetime’s worth of Buckskin’s climbing opportunities. There are many three pitch plus routes with great features. Splitter cracks abound along with overhanging amphitheaters, large flakes and terrifying off-width cracks. We kept saying, if a flash flood came down and we had gear, we could climb out of harm’s way. At least in theory!
However, good weather ensured our progress as we basked in the sublime beauty of this subterranean gem. The canyon continued to surprise us with its diverse terrain. For instance, we never knew how deep the pools we crossed were going to be or if the floor was solid or ankle-deep goo. There were a number of blind corners as well. You wouldn’t know if you were turning right or left until you were right at the turn.
At times, the Gulch narrowed down to just over a shoulder’s width. In other places, it opened up and allowed warm air from outside the canyon to mix with its own cooler flow. We saw few animals but did see and hear the calls of western ravens as they darted in-and-out through the folds in the rock strata overhead.
As we strolled down canyon, the light constantly changed giving us phantasmagorical contrast. At mile 10.5, there is a middle entrance to Buckskin Gulch but we were not able to positively identify it. As the day turned to evening, we decided to look for some high ground to spend the night. We knew we still had to down climb a large boulder jam and that was still about a mile and a half from the Paria Buckskin confluence. Down climbing the jam in the dark could have been problematic.
Since there was no rain in the forecast nor concern for flash flooding, we stopped when we found a flat, elevated platform off the canyon floor. As it turned out, it was the last place with a site like that inside the Gulch. The next morning, as we sat eating breakfast, we watched the scorpions skitter around the dinner plate-sized chunks of desiccated mud. We gathered our stuff, left no trace of our stay and continued for about an hour until we hit the beginning of THE boulder field.
It ended with a twelve to fifteen foot (3.5-4.5M) rappel. Not knowing if any ropes or webbing were in place at that juncture, we brought sufficient 5mm Technora Tech Cord to make the rap. We use our own gear even though there were a couple of fixed lines. At the bottom of the rappel on climber’s right is where I saw steps chopped into a boulder. At present with a flat, sandy landing and if you are comfortable down climbing VO+ on mildly slopey, dirty steps, you could by-pass the rope descent.
As we continued to press on to the confluence, the morning light gave us another outstanding show.
The small clear stream now flowing under our feet told us we were on the last half mile of Buckskin Gulch. The water comes from up high on the canyon walls. It takes thousands of years for the water to seep through the porous rock before it reaches the canyon floor. For us, it was nice to know we could actually filter the water without killing our water filters. Before long, we reached the Paria River, turned north and started what we thought would be the last seven plus miles of the trek.
Three miles later, the narrows end but not without a few more pool crossings and photographs. We were especially intrigued by the some of the large plates of desiccated mud. We saw a few that were almost 3 feet square (1 meter) and about an inch thick (2.5cm).
Approaching the White House Trailhead, we are flanked by a diverse assortment of Navajo Sandstone formations. At this point, the Paria River is wide and dry and the sun is warm but not blazing. We try to walk on the shady side of the river since we have just run out of water. Now, we are thinking about getting to the trailhead and securing a ride to our car at the Buckskin trailhead.
From the west bank of the Paria, we see a two-column formation that looks like an index and middle finger together. Crossing over to that landmark, we find ourselves in the middle of the White House Campground and the usual end of the hike. No one was stirring in the parking lot, so without debate, we walked another two miles, hot, thirsty and now dusty.
Fortunately, when we reached the Paria Information Station, a local retired couple, unfazed by our trail grime, took pity on us giving us a lift to our car. Wilderness brings out the best in people as witnessed by the kindness of our lift benefactors. After a rousing chat about saving the environment and global warming, we bid our farewells, thanking them again.
Two hours later, after the hot showers, hot food and quaffing of our favorite beverages, the maps came out again. This time we scanned the desert topography for potential winter undertakings. After all, it’s never too late to start conspiring on your next venture. However, this time, we won’t procrastinate twenty-five years.
©adrenalinshots/ernest shiwanov 2008
http://www.blm.gov/az/paria 
