Trip Report A Swell quickhitter

Kevin B.

Big hippy
Moderator
Location
Vehicular limbo
Camp goes up quick these days...

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We call this "goupalada". Seasoned ground beef, black beans, peppers, corn, etc. with all the side fixins. Heats up in two minutes, nothing but a pan to wipe out when you're done.
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I've been working hard to get my camp setup streamlined, and I can tell it's working when I've got the bag thrown out and and dinner cooked while Josh is still setting up his tent.
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I don't know the name of this butte but I took a lot of pics of it this weekend. Here the setting sun hit it just right.
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Kevin B.

Big hippy
Moderator
Location
Vehicular limbo
Not much else to report. Having seen what we came to see, we left Tomsich with the idea that we'd run up Buckmaster to find camp, but we didn't find anything worth photographing in Buckmaster and the "road" we ended up on devolved into a bumpy twisty little two track with no good spots to camp and no chance of hitting anything decent for another several hours. So with daylight fading we backtracked to US6 and beelined for home.
 

zmotorsports

Hardcore Gearhead
Vendor
Location
West Haven, UT
Looks awesome. The wife and I would like to sneak off back down there one more time this year. Only wheeled there once back in April and we loved it. Definitely need to do more exploring as I hadn't even heard of the areas that you mentioned.

We found Black Dragon Wash and loved driving through that just north off of I-70 around mile marker 149 and then another day we went over to Swasey's Cabin and took a side route down into Eagle Canyon into the ravine heading south before joining back up with the main road. On the last day there we took a drive down into Red Canyon and that was a beautiful drive.
 

zmotorsports

Hardcore Gearhead
Vendor
Location
West Haven, UT
I have a few questions for you guys who are familiar with the Swell.

Is the Swinging Bridge directly on Buckhorn Wash road? I think Buckhorn takes off directly off of I-70 at exit 131 going north, correct?

Next question is Muddy Creek area. Is that located at the far west side of Reds Canyon near Tomsich Butte? I think the wife and I will have 2 full days to explore and I was thinking of spending one north of I-70 and one south of I-70.

We really liked Black Dragon wash/canyon and want to do it again but also explore some new areas. I was thinking of taking off I-70 at the east side of Black Dragon wash, going through the wash over to Buckhorn wash road then head north to explore around the Swinging Bridge if I am thinking of the correct area.

On the second day I was thinking of heading south and over to Swasey's Cabin then we played in Eagle's Canyon last time but I think we missed the turn to go under the I-70 bridges last time so thought we would find that turn off, go under the I-70 bridges, then come back down and connect with the road to Reds Canyon. I would like to explore Reds Canyon a bit more and heard that Muddy Creek and some cool mining areas were in Reds Canyon.

I would appreciate any thoughts.

Thank you.

Mike
 

Kevin B.

Big hippy
Moderator
Location
Vehicular limbo
I have a few questions for you guys who are familiar with the Swell.

Is the Swinging Bridge directly on Buckhorn Wash road? I think Buckhorn takes off directly off of I-70 at exit 131 going north, correct?

Next question is Muddy Creek area. Is that located at the far west side of Reds Canyon near Tomsich Butte? I think the wife and I will have 2 full days to explore and I was thinking of spending one north of I-70 and one south of I-70.

We really liked Black Dragon wash/canyon and want to do it again but also explore some new areas. I was thinking of taking off I-70 at the east side of Black Dragon wash, going through the wash over to Buckhorn wash road then head north to explore around the Swinging Bridge if I am thinking of the correct area.

On the second day I was thinking of heading south and over to Swasey's Cabin then we played in Eagle's Canyon last time but I think we missed the turn to go under the I-70 bridges last time so thought we would find that turn off, go under the I-70 bridges, then come back down and connect with the road to Reds Canyon. I would like to explore Reds Canyon a bit more and heard that Muddy Creek and some cool mining areas were in Reds Canyon.

I would appreciate any thoughts.

Thank you.

Mike
Yes, Swinging Bridge is where Buckhorn Wash pops out and joins the San Rafael River. The road then keeps going south to I70 at the Sinbad interchange (not sure what exit that is?), but if you cross under the freeway there you will be on Temple Mountain Rd and headed for Reds.

The Muddy does run by the base of Tomsich, and the Reds Canyon Rd will take you there. If you spend some time out of the rig tromping around the mine areas at Tomsich and Lucky Strike you could spend a whole day in there easy. The problem with giving advice about touring the Swell is there's so much to see and it's hard to know what pace other travellers like to move at, but if you wrap up in Reds and have some time, consider driving over to Temple Mountain or down to Hidden Splendor, two more mining areas with great scenery.
 
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