Trip Report: Hole in the Rock March 22-25 2012

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[youtube]F8sAn8dOwUU[/youtube]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F8sAn8dOwUU&feature=youtu.be

Thursday, March 22, 2012

It was 3:10 PM and Brandon and I were ten minutes late meeting our Hole in the Rock group at Cabelas. Brandon was still welding on his bump stops and I was still cutting out the wood for my sleeping platform.

At 3:25 Brandon and I (and our wives) headed over to Cabelas to meet the group. We were a bit late, but Josh, XXXXX, Brian, Trevor, John and Melissa were there patiently waiting for us.


We hit the road at 3:30 and headed straight for Price. Just outside of price we ran across these guys. Dylan is always talking about the toyota market in Mexico and how people buy them up here to import them into mexico for 3x the price they get here. Until this trip, I hadn't seen anything firsthand, but there were two guys, each flat towing a toyota truck with their toyota truck. ANd these weren't even the 3.0 v6, they were towing with a 2.4L 4cyl, and they were flat towing rigs that weighed more than the tow rig in the first place. I can only assume they went through more than one set of brakes on the trip and that they headed for mexico and their trucks were to be sold for a lot more than they got them for. That's a 1985 pickup pulling an 89-95 pickup (which weighs quite a bit more than the '85). This picture belongs in the "dumb towing loads" thread.

After an uneventful trip to Price, we topped off our groceries and headed out to Green River where we met up with Scott and Alice and checked out their sweet sami and new trailer they brought. We all headed down to Hanksville for our last gas before the airport.

Since the ferry wasn’t in operation for another week or two, we had to cross at the Hite Crossing Bridge. By the time we got to Fry Canyon Ruins Rd. it was dark. Eric heard us on the CB and gave us directions to camp and we met up with him for a nice fire on a chilly night.

It was very cold that night. I remember my wife waking me up in the middle of the night asking for her fleece sleeping bag liner. Even with my 0* down bag I felt the chill of the night creeping in.

Some time during the night Don and Dwayne had caught up with us.

 

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Friday, March 23, 2012​

We awoke to ice-coated tents and windows. Eric got the fire going and everyone stumbled out of their tents and vehicles for some breakfast.

After a quick breakfast we walked up the canyon until we could see the Fry Canyon Ruins from across the canyon.

I’d really like to hike and explore Fry Canyon on another (warmer) day, it looked like an awesome slot canyon to explore.

 

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From Fry Canyon we headed to the Carl Black Memorial airport (open 24/7). The airport is run by a great group of guys who are super friendly.

As much as we expected the gas to be $10/gal, it was only $3.89, 10 cents cheaper than Hanksville. We were more than happy to support these guys. Spencer and Celeste met up with us at the airport.

Frieedling found a friend at the Airport.

After topping off the tanks, we took advantage of the last flushable toilet we’d see for 3 days, thanked our friendly gas attendants, and left the airport, headed to the Hole in the Rock Trailhead.

 

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At the trailhead we aired down, disconnected sway bars, and got excited to finally be hitting the trail.

By this time it was 11 AM. Don and Spencer were the only two who had driven the trail before; Don drove it 25 years ago, and Spencer only drove half of it. So most of us didn’t know what to expect. I had a few hikes planned for the day, and I had an idea of where I wanted to set up camp Friday night, but I had no clue if we’d make good time or not, with 10 rigs and around 18 people. The first few miles of trail were a smooth two-track dirt road that meandered around for a bit until we came upon the famed half-track. Even though we’d only been on the trail for 10 minutes or so, it was too cool to pass up.

 

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From the Halftrack the trail got progressively rockier until it turned to slickrock. We really liked the way this trail starts out as an easy dirt road that gradually progresses to a rock-crawling trail. It allows the beginner drivers to gradually ease their way into the trail and get used to the obstacles one at a time.

The first real obstacle we encountered was a section of slickrock with a steep downhill section with a turn in the middle of it. Just to be safe, we decided to use a spotter to get down safely.

 

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The trail wandered back and forth, transitioning from sand to slickrock. At times it was a bit difficult finding the trail, but between the white painted dashed lines and the newer green “Hole in the Rock Trail” signs, we found our way.

After a few hours we were ready for lunch and we began looking for a nice shady spot to stop at. Unfortunately, at noon in mid-March there isn’t much shade to be had. So we decided to stop for lunch at the HITR/Lake Canyon fork in the trail. A few years ago Lake Canyon trail washed away (down a cliff) and it is no longer driveable. In fact, I had a hard time distinguishing where the Lake Canyon Trail used to be. It just goes to show how quickly the land will bury our traces of being there. Overall I was very impressed with the lack of trash on the trail; it’s nice to see so many people stay on the trail and pick up after themselves, especially on a trail like this.

Following lunch, we ran into a nasty section of trail. Personally, this is section represents my least favorite type of terrain. It’s too bumpy to baja, but not bumpy enough to have any fun “obstacles” so you’re stuck going slow over bumpy, jarring terrain for several miles. After what seemed like an hour of this terrain we soon came upon Grey Mesa.

We had heard about this spot from Spencer, past trip reports, and from “The Undaunted” book about the original pioneers who created this route. It was nice to finally get to rock crawl some good obstacles. Everyone made it up the first section just fine without any problems.

Coming down that last little ledge was nowhere near as bad as it looks in the pictures, it was a walk in the park.

 

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We decided to stop and hike around at Grey Mesa for a couple hours.

Spencer told us about a hike that took us to some of the areas the pioneers came through.

We came upon these steps that the pioneers carved to come down this area.

The view at the top was spectacular.

 

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After our hike, we continued on the trail. Perhaps the most under-rated section of the trail was what followed next. I assume it's still considered "Grey Mesa." It is higher in elevation than the "Grey Mesa" sign. This section is not for the faint of heart, as it has many steep climbs, boulders that require good articulation, and off-camber tippy spots that tip you downhill, towards a 60-150 foot drop on your passenger side. This section made me quite nervous, and I remember talking with Scott afterward, remarking that the trail was a lot more difficult than we anticipated. We weren't complaining, we like difficult trails, we were just surprised that we hadn’t heard about this section before. Everyone mentions the Chute and the little drop down at Grey Mesa, but I hadn’t heard anything about this section, or seen any pictures of this section. It was quite daunting. I can’t imagine dragging a wagon down this section.

Everyone watched on as the rigs slowly made their way up this long technical stretch.

I'm not sure if this was an original peg used for this road, but I liked to think it was

 

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after that section, the road opened up into 2wd, 35mph fire roads with the occasional rocky section...

... which led to the breathtaking great bend overlook.

This section led us to the Chute. We were losing daylight and we were glad to arrive at the Chute before dark. The goal was to arrive at Coors Camp for the night, and it was on the other side of the Chute. The Chute is not nearly as bad as it looks. None of us had a problem getting down the chute.

By the time we all got through the chute, it was getting dark fast. We were pushing hard to get through to our campsite before dark. Unfortunately we were so hurried that nobody took any pictures, which is a shame because the trail had some big obstacles after the chute. One was an incredibly off-camber left hand turn with a tree on your right (stay to the right) and the other was an insanely steep drop down a rock fin. Darkness set in, and we still weren't at camp. But nobody complained, even though I'm sure a lot of people were ready for camp. I spotted what I thought was Coors Camp, but I wasn't sure because it just looked like a clearing that we could all fit in. Scott led the way in the dark, with the excellent help of his wife Alice, who made sure we were on the trail. Our GPS units indicated that we were nearing the end of the trail. Sure enough, around 8:30 or 9 we arrived at the end of the trail, an hour or two after the chute. I was worried that the campsite at the end of the trail wouldn't fit our large group, but I was wrong. It was the perfect campsite to end our busy day at.

Right as we got in to camp, I could faintly hear someone calling us on the CB. We cranked our dials to the max and realized it was Dwayne calling us. I was at the front of the group and I hadn't realized that he and Don had gotten separated from us. Last I remembered, they were heading down the chute and were right behind us. Dwayne told us that Don had flopped his jeep on its side right after descending the chute. Everyone was ok, but they were an hour and a half behind us, and had just righted his jeep.

We got a fire going and started preparing dinner.

Dwayne and Don caught up with us around 10 PM. Surprisingly, his jeep didn't have too much damage considering it was a roll onto its side. We were just glad they caught up to us and that everyone was safe. We all went to sleep and slept like babies that night, as the temperatures were quite a bit warmer than the night before.

 

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Saturday Morning​

We awoke to a beautiful morning. Since we got in to camp at dark the night before, we didn't really get a good view of the landscape. It was quite breathtaking.

In the daylight we were able to see the damage to Don's jeep. He had already straightened out the fender. It really looked good considering it had been flopped the night before.

Before leaving our campsite, we decided to take a short hike down the trail and see what the pioneers came up.

As much as we wanted to believe that this was a 150 year old winch line, I think it's a bit too modern.

This is what they came up after crossing the Colorado.

You can still see the marks the winches and wagon wheels left behind.

John found a cool piece of quartz embedded in the sandstone.

 

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After that, we headed back to the chute to explore the canyons there.

We stopped at the Chute to have lunch and go exploring.

About half the group went exploring, and the other half sat around and chatted and relaxed in the shade of John's canopy. Those of us that went exploring saw some cool slot canyons and cool water pockets. This one was at least 4 feet deep.

There were several sections of the slot canyon where we had to practice our "stemming" technique.

Despite being 7 1/2 months pregnant, Celeste had no problem stemming across these gaps, and she set the bar for the boys and the girls. It was apparent that she's done this before.

Jen couldn't wimp out after a pregnant woman just made it across. So she went too, although her stemming technique was a little different. She was a trooper and she faced her fears more than anyone in the group.

At the end of this slot, Brandon found a scummy pond to go swimming in. We were all pretty hot, so the water sounded refreshing. It turned out to be extremely cold since it spends 90% of the day in the shade.

Somehow he convinced me to go in too.

 

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Then we headed over to the other side of the canyon and decided to explore there as well. This was a cool area to explore, but the pots were much bigger and much deeper. I could have spent all day exploring this area. It was definitely the highlight of the trip for me.

Fender loves exploring slot canyons, but sometimes he can't descend the big ledges by himself. If I hold his back feet, he doesn't fight me as much.

On this side, the pots got really big. At one section, it was far easier to swim across the pot than it was to climb around, so I threw fender in and swam behind him to the other side of the canyon. The water was much warmer and much cleaner in this pot.

After this section, the next pot had about a 15 foot drop into it, and we couldn't tell how deep the water was. We didn't bring our rappel gear, so we turned around and headed back to the trucks to meet up with the group.

 

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From there we continued on and climbed up the chute.

 

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from there we headed back to Grey Mesa for our last hike of the day to the spillway of iceberg canyon. I wasn't sure the exact place everyone told me to go to, so we just followed the GPS to where the cliffs were.


As always, we found the slot canyon in the middle of a perfectly good trail.

We reached the end and found an incredible view.

As DAA has stated in the past, there is something primal in a human, that when they reach a large cliff, they have to throw large objects off of it. We couldn't resist the urge.

 

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We then headed back to our rigs at Grey Mesa.

Josh got stuck coming down a big ledge and ended up having to go around the long way.

We got our rigs ready to move out, but Brandon's runner wouldn't start. He and Scott spent about 20 min diagnosing the issue. The determined it was either the AFM or the TPS. Scott smacked the AFM a few times, and they got it to start. He turned the idle up to 2000 RPM and Brandon was able to drive out with that fix. We now call him "Michael Jackson" due to the white gloves he busted out for this repair.

Molly had a long day.

With everyone's rigs up and running, we were ready to go.

Surprisingly, nobody had trouble with this ledge. But about 2 feet after they got up the ledge is where they struggled a bit. (well, no everyone)

 

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After Grey Mesa, we headed out past the great bend, and through the nasty, slow, bumpy few miles between there and lakeshore. We pulled into our final campsite as the sun was setting. We decided to camp at the intersection of lakeshore and HITR.

Fender was so tired he climbed in to bed on his own.

We prepared dinner, some had a shower courtsey of John's sweet shower setup, and we started what was potentially the greatest campfire in the history of campfires. We all had a bunch of extra wood left over, so we chucked it all into the fire. It burned hot and long, and provided for some great chatting between new friends.

 

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Eric arose before the sun to take some stunning photos before the sun hid itself behind a sheet of clouds.

From there we headed out to finish the trail and gas back up at the airport.

At the airport Cody noticed a problem with my rig.

Thank you Cody, you probably saved the life of me and my wife by noticing that. While I went in to pay for my gas, I came out and the others were already under there fixing it for me.

Using a hi-lift, a hammer, and a ratchet strap, we were able to pull the rear axle forward enough to pound the bolt back in. I had obviously lost the nut and washer, and nobody had a matching one, so we improvised. We clamped some vice grips onto the bolt, then zip-tied the handles together, and used gorrilla tape to tape the entire contraption to the frame. It held all the way home (and it's still holding to this day on the truck.) I have since purchased a spare bolt, washer, and nut in the odd chance that this happens again to me or someone else I'm with. Thanks to everyone who helped fix this.

After that, Brandon's rig started acting up again. It was the AFM. Scott and Brandon took the AFM apart and cleaned the contacts, and got it back running like it should. They were able to lower the idle back down to a normal speed, and we were on our way out of there.

 

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On our way out, we decided to swing by and explore the castle ruins, just a few miles from the airport. I had seen ruins before, but this was the first set that I was able to see up close.

Can you see the ruins? They're pretty tough to see from the road.

Unfortunately most of the ruins had been ruined, but a few walls, doors, and windows remained.

 

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After that, Spencer, Celeste, Cody, my wife, and I decided that we hadn't spent enough time driving this week, so we decided to journey out to Natural Bridges National Monument. Anyone know the difference between a national monument and a national park? A national park requires congressional approval, while a national monument can be appointed by a president of the US without congressional approval. I believe FDR established Natural Bridges. It's historically a lot older than the grand canyon. Natural Bridges is one of the darkest places in Utah since there aren't any major cities nearby to contribute to light pollution.

We didn't have time to do any of the hikes, so all our pictures were less than spectacular, and were taken from the overlook road. I think it'd be a fun place to explore for a day (except that they're not dog friendly, and they won't let you leave your dog in your car either). All the hikes were under 2 miles, and they seemed to be worth the time.

After our scenic loop drive we had lunch and headed for home.

 

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In summary, this was a fantastic trip. The first day of the trail I didn't really feel like the trail was worth the 6 hour drive to the trailhead, followed by so much bumpy terrain and obstacles that were either too easy, or too scary. However, after the first day my opinion of the trail changed. The hikes really added to the experience, and for some reason, the trail was about twice as much fun coming back. I'm not sure if its because I knew what to expect, or if the obstacles are more fun in the "out" direction or what, but it was twice as much fun going in.

This trip was one of the best that I've been on, mainly due to the incredible group of people on the trip. We all have many more friendships than we started with, and I think the feeling is mutual that we'd love to do more trails together in the future. Many people were skeptical of taking a group of 11 rigs through at once (including me). However, everyone was great. There were no egos, no hot-shots, just a lot of people willing to help each other out no matter what. Honestly, I don't think we would have finished the trail much quicker if we had only had 3 rigs. I don't feel like the number of rigs slowed us down one bit. We were lucky that everyone had (mostly) reliable rigs and that they had some experience driving on more advanced trails. We couldn't have asked for better weather, better scenery, or better company. I can't wait to go back again sometime. Hopefully it will be with some of these great new friends that I met. Thanks for taking the time to read this trip report, I hope it helps many people in the future as they plan their trips.