The Moab Weekend Report

[devinsixtyseven]

We awoke late...ten hours of sleep seemed reasonable, considering the five or six we got the previous night. Our tent was sun-baked, and after a lazy breakfast, a little map-searching and a snack-related mishap, we headed toward Ruin Park (we skipped the offshoots in House and Middle Parks, we'll be back another time).

The ruins are really interesting. The signs don't say who made them, but the largest--Farmhouse Ruin--has a sign explaining the area and how it was used for cultivation in the 11th and 12th centuries (IIRC). There are quite a few ruins there, most are large enough to be visible from the road. They're in good shape for being almost a thousand years old...one of the pinon roof beams is still intact in Farmhouse Ruin, much of the mud/cement is still in place in the walls, and several of the structures still have windows, doors, and other features.

After Ruin Park, there's a great sign on the side of the road..."4WD Road, Jeeps Only." I thought about getting a pic but didn't. Later, there's an even better sign...big, bright, new, reflective, just before the drop-in to Bobby's Hole, prior to Impossible Hill...warning of rough conditions ahead. We saw this as a good sign, got a picture and proceeded ahead through a couple of switchbacks and a small grassland, and then found another similar sign. It too proclaimed doom, destruction and chaos for all who dared pass...and we happily cruised down Impossible Hill (a lot less Impossible now that the Park Service has added traction mats on the sandy sections of the hill). If we had more time we'd have gone back up, but we were burning daylight and had a long way to go. The rest of the road north went by somewhere between Fast and Plaid, but we did stop at Horsehoof. That's one of the rougher campsite access spurs I've even seen, but with a great view of Needles and the Grabens once you're there. It reminded me of the Dollhouse. We exited Elephant Hill without drama or damage, hit the Moab Brewery for a quick meal, and got outta town, with a bunch of ideas for weekends in the future.

Pics to come!

-Sean

 

[kcowyo]

Driving to and over Bear's Ears is quite an experience. You start in a desert, red dirt, hot, scrubby pinon pines everywhere, and as you climb to the Bear's ears, around 8000ft, the land changes from desert to alpine tundra, aspen trees, pine, waving grasslands, even ponds here and there.

After Ruin Park, there's a great sign on the side of the road..."4WD Road, Jeeps Only." I thought about getting a pic but didn't.

The road over Bear's Ears is so different than everything around it, that I thought I had taken a wrong turn and driven into Colorado. It's the last thing you expect when you get up there. Just a great oasis up top.

Oh, and I got a photo of the "Jeeps Only" sign as I drove by in my Toyota. I will admit though that it would be nice to travel that area with no top.

Great write up Sean. Sounds like another great weekend in Canyonlands. I'm looking forward to returning there this weekend myself.

 

[devinsixtyseven]

Photos are here.

--Arch Canyon Overlook, on Elk Ridge...the road from Bear's Ears.

--Cathedral Butte (RHS) and Cathedral Point (CEN), looking to the East in to the southern end of Salt Creek wash. We should've brought out the binoculars here, as Kirk Cabin and other things may have been visible from that vantage point.

--Ruin Park, looking to the South from Farmhouse Ruin. This area was cultivated almost a thousand years ago.

--Cross Canyon, seen from the southerly entrance. This is where the first of the large "4WD Only" signs appears.

 

[devinsixtyseven]

--Descending Impossible Hill. Erosion/traction mats were added at some point to add the hill climb where it's sandy. Not very impossible anymore, it looks pretty easy what with the traction mats. Impossible Hill descends from Pappy's Pasture down to Bobby's Hole.

--Tundras in the grasslands of the Grabens/Red Lake Zone, looking back toward Bobby's Hole.

--A medium-sized outcropping of slickrock between Bobby's Hole and the Park boundary.

--Chesler Park, seen from the southern entrance.

--SOB Hill. It's really not that difficult, almost a "baby" version of The Squeeze combined with Turntable. It's a loose uphill followed by a hard right turn and very little room for maneuvering or error. It looks from the tracks like a lot of people back through the slot in to the opening on the right side of the photo, behind the truck, then continue nose-first. The three times I've gone through there I just did a quick 3-point.

--The view from the slot at the top of SOB Hill.

I suspect the obstacles at Elephant Hill and The Grabens were named back in the day when 33" tires were considered massive. I can see how near-stock SWB vehicles with small tires and open diffs would have a great deal of trouble with things like Silver Stairs, SOB Hill, Elephant Hill, and the other named obstacles. Since it's been paved by the Park Service, the obstacles aren't nearly as difficult, and intentionally taking the hard line becomes the game of the day, which brings us to the next set of photos :truck:...

 

[devinsixtyseven]

--Silver Stairs. The asphalt ramps are easy to spot. It's still fun, and still requires careful driving for a near-stock rig.

--A large slickrock section after the Confluence Overlook/EH Loop split. There are three lines here, one is a bypass, the other is the "normal" way, this is just the steep and direct line. Yes that is a piece of fender trim falling off! Hot sun and dry sand point to a different solution in the future.

 

[durangodds]

--Descending Impossible Hill. Erosion/traction mats were added at some point to add the hill climb where it's sandy. Not very impossible anymore, it looks pretty easy what with the traction mats. Impossible Hill descends from Pappy's Pasture down to Bobby's Hole.

I thought that was SOB Hill that came down from Pappy's Pasture to Bobby's Hole. To get to Impossible Hill you needed to turn left at the bottom of SOB on a little used road. You only go a few hundred yards and you'll find what they mean by Impossible.

See this thread here. http://expeditionportal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5364&page=3

"Also, Impossible Hill is not on the Beef Basin entrance to CNP. It is on a side trail about 1 mile to the southwest from Bobby's Hole and doesn't need to be driven to get to the Needles. Bobby's Hole has been stabilized with that black plastic honeycomb material to keep the dirt in place and is passable to all 4wd vehicles.

Impossible Hill is at 38*2.238N; 109*56.908W, it looks like people just drive down and back up. The road past there is really faint."

Was there a VW Golf still sitting there when you went by? When we were in there over Memorial Day there was one in Bobby's Hole with a note from the owner saying he was coming back to fix it.

 

[devinsixtyseven]

Heyyyy...you're right. I wondered where that spur led, at the bottom of Bobby's Hole.

The Z-turn between grabens is indeed SOB Hill. I guess the Bobby's Hole hill climb remains unnamed.

SOB Hill has been nerfed since some of the photos I found from four years ago, much like the rest of the area. I wonder when they'll just pave the entire route .

Sounds like some interesting hikes in the area, we'll have to check them out next time we're south of Chesler.

 

[devinsixtyseven]

We hit the desert again last weekend, for Katie's B-day and to do some arch hunting.

Friday, we headed west and took a rainy detour over Resolution Mountain...we didn't get the views we sought, but we did get the hair-raising experience of controlled slides down steep, muddy McAllister Gulch...I got to choose the direction and had a little input with the brakes, but the mountain chose whether we were going up or down. I've been up Resolution before, but with mud-packed A/Ts, we were denied and had to back down the spur leading to the top...not terribly fun. It was the harbinger of a rainy weekend, fortunately our only risky experience in the wet, however.

Saturday, we pulled in to the Needles ranger station and picked up a permit for Lavender Canyon. Their sign stated "Not Recommend", since the sand is deep, wide, continuous, and the route follows a wash for almost 20 miles. Some is ranch land, we saw at least one herd of cattle, and some of the wash was wet from recent rain.

The route isn't hard to find, with a topo map. Without it, there are ranch roads and other washes in the area, easy to get on the wrong path. It wasn't the last time we pulled the map on this trip, we got a lot of use from the GPS and the maps this weekend!

With 13psi in front and 10psi in the rear, we didn't have a problem in the sand. It was indeed very deep and soft, the sort where you could step on the surface and your boot would sink a couple inches. It was easy to see how a flash flood could leave a vehicle buried to the windshield, as happened in the spring...it was abandoned in March or April, and the area was too soft to recover the vehicle until June.

There are two almost unnoticeable ruin sites in the canyon, and three arches, as well as beautiful scenery and at least one side canyon to explore. We skipped the side canyon as well as Davis Canyon, and headed to the back of Lavender Canyon to see massive Cleft Arch, graceful Handhold Arch, and aptly-named Caterpillar Arch (it looks like the mouth of a caterpillar).

Lavender Canyon has almost no shade, particularly this time of year at midday. We did find a shady overhang for lunch, one of very few in the canyon.

On the way out, we raced a rainstorm...the clouds followed us, as we went as fast as low pressure would safely allow. The first drops appeared as we neared the highway, and by the time we were back at the ranger station it was raining sideways. We found later, when we left Needles for the Moab area, the road was flooding several inches in a few places.

Originally, we intended to camp at Peekaboo and explore Salt Creek and Horse Canyon. Heavy rain changed our minds, as the path through Horse Canyon is very similar to Lavender Canyon, and Peekaboo is very exposed. Nearby lightning strikes and increasingly heavy rain had us pointed toward Moab, and the rangers were kind enough to let us push our reservations back two weeks (y'all are invited). We left Needles in a driving rainstorm, got cleaned up in town and had a relaxed B-day dinner for Katie at the Desert Bistro, in north Moab.

Sunday, we decided to do something around Moab. Since we were arch hunting, and Katie has expressed interest in the past to see Gemini Bridges, we figured we'd see it on the way out of town. The trail/road is very easy, a 2wd car could easily get to Gemini Bridges and then a guy could hike the last 0.25 mile to the Bridges from the road. They're impressive, and the ledges leading down the last quarter mile are pretty fun.

From Gemini Bridges, the road leads toward UT313, with frequent turnoffs for camping, the Metal Masher 4WD trail, and another route marked with a BLM sign for "Four Arch Trail" and "Crips Hole". We headed down Four Arch Trail, which leads in to a narrow canyon. It looks like it was the access road for the power line in the canyon. We were probably the first people in the area in a month at least, and the trail didn't look like it was used much in general. It was fairly easy, with two short sections that required careful driving and good tire placement to climb out of an eroded, boulder-strewn wash and another to climb up an off-camber ledge on a sidehill, all on a track barely one vehicle wide.

We didn't see the arches until we'd turned around. One is a tall, graceful arch, where a massive chunk of rock fell away near the end of a fin, leaving the end of the fin intact. The other three are holes in a fin, created similarly but without the same obvious result as the first arch. We felt pretty good, since the arches aren't listed on any of the maps we had, nor was the route, and it looked rarely used.

From there, we had originally planned to come down Long Canyon, but with the tires already aired down, and other trails so close, we spotted Hellroaring Arch nearby and plotted a course.

What we actually found is that Mineral Point road is indistinguishable without GPS and/or mileage markers from Horsethief Trail, Horsethief Campground, and an unmarked spur leading from 313 to Hellroaring Rim trail. We probably needed to take the campground road, but took the unmarked spur instead. We only realized the error when Tombstone Rock came in to view, Hellroaring Canyon was off to the left, and we were on top of a hill looking at a straight section of trail leading in to the distance in front of us.

Out came the map and the GPS, and a half hour of spur hunting later, we located the Hellroaring Arch spur road leading directly up the side of a wash where several spurs all come together in the wash bottom. It hadn't been driven (nor had the other spurs) in weeks, easily, if it had been driven at all since April (it is used for Easter Jeep Safari). It wasn't easy to locate, it's not obvious, and looks exactly like the surrounding walls of the wash.

We drove up the spur, found ourselves overlooking Hellroaring Canyon, and a short hike later located the arch...we were originally parked and standing directly in line with the fin that forms the arch.

It's a big, sturdy arch. You can see it from both sides, if you can climb the ledges leading around to the back view. There was another road leading back from there, we didn't follow it very far as it was getting late.

Pics when they're developed! We used the cameras you send in for digital conversion, it'll be a couple weeks.

-Sean

 

[devinsixtyseven]

Seems like it's been forever since we were on the trail.

Last weekend we packed up for a test run with the new build...it's really like a whole new truck, about all it shares with a 1st-gen Tundra now is the frame, engine, transmission and transfer case.

The weather was very good. We could have camped, but with little time to prepare and cheap rates, we picked the Sleep Inn as they allow dogs.

I chose Sevenmile Rim as a good, moderately difficult test, as it included trail, slickrock, rock crawling, offcamber, ledge climbs, fast sections, soft sand and a little mud. The next day we'd climb Long Canyon and find snow, ice, and mud...we covered every form of terrain and style of offroad travel in two days, which really let me evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the build.

There are some great spurs and loops off Sevenmile Rim. The truck still feels stable in situations like this:

Most of the northeast area of Sevenmile Rim looks like this...chunky 4WD road, not difficult, just bumpy. 10# pressure soaked up the chatter.

Route finding can get a little difficult on this loop...particularly when the sign points straight ahead to the middle of a Y in the trail. While we were hunting for the trail, we met a group of people doing the same thing...several Jeep builds and a Toyota build. It was interesting to see the difference made by wheelbase, width, flex, suspension, tire pressure and driving style. They were all great people, maybe we'll meet them again in Moab another day. The guy driving the red Jeep just behind my truck is one of the Hatch brothers, of Hatch River Expeditions.

 

[devinsixtyseven]

Further south, we found a small "play area" to test the climbing ability of our builds. It was interesting to see the difference a few inches of wheelbase made here...my truck's nearly 130" wheelbase easily crawled up this rounded ledge at 10# with the rear locked, while shorter wheelbases on more substantial builds struggled.

Everyone stopped for lunch at this wash. Great group of people, great rigs.

After lunch, we cruised on ahead to look for the route down to Uranium Arch. Our guidebook (Wells) and the topo map were not enough to adequately find the correct route down to the base of the arch, but we did find a route that connected to the loop described in the Wells book. The other group continued on and found the correct route, which we took back up to Sevenmile Rim. One side of the loop to the base of the arch was covered in snow and ice and was effectively impassable at the time, we'll come back.

 

[devinsixtyseven]

Sevenmile Rim eventually winds around Monitor and Merrimac Buttes, with a long section on tilted slickrock. It's not dangerous, just unnerving since the lean is to the driver's side and quickly drops away. None of the pictures were as exciting as it felt from the driver's seat.

This squeeze was wide enough by a few inches to let an LT-equipped Tundra pass...this is the "burnt toast" mentioned in the Wells book.

There's a bit of steep, tilted slickrock underneath Merrimac Butte, with a great view of Wipeout Hill. Again, the pictures aren't nearly as interesting as this felt from the driver's seat. The gentleman to photo left of my truck is walking the line in preparation for his own group driving this section.

Wipeout Hill is so close to this point I decided it had to be done. This turned out to be very good and very bad, as my rear softline had been rubbing the yoke at full compression on a series of whoops earlier.

I was holding this position for a photo when I felt a tiny "pop" in the brake pedal, followed by the horrible feeling of the brake pedal sinking to the floorboard. After standing on the ebrake pedal and alerting Katie to absolutely under no condition stand directly downhill of the truck, I was able to let the truck down in control with what pedal remained and assess the situation.

The braided cover was completely worn away where the yoke had rubbed, and there was a quarter inch slit in the hydraulic liner where it had burst when it was no longer supported by the cover. I was getting gloomy at the prospect of hunting down a new brake line in Moab on a Saturday evening or Sunday, and wondering how we'd get back to Denver if no line could be found. Someone in a group nearby mentioned they normally pinch the line with vise grips when this happens, fortunately we had a set and with a strap, some zip ties, a set of vise grips, and some electrical tape, we limped back to 313 from Wipeout Hill and in to Moab. The group of Jeeps we'd met earlier showed up, and were incredibly helpful and encouraging, plenty of kind words and advice to offer...I think they could tell this was a new situation for me, and most of them were very, very experienced with this and worse. The guys that suggested the vise grips were in the process of repairing a broken axle on a Jeep halfway up Wipeout Hill, thoroughly secured with makeshift wheel chocks, a second rig higher up, and a HiLift jack. I found out later they successfully repaired the axle and extracted the stuck rig.

The Napa in Moab stocks JIC(AN)-4 lines in varying lengths, and has AN-3 to AN-4 adapters. My truck has 10/1.0 metric lines, with adapters to the AN-3 lines, so with another pair of adapters we made it work, and we repaired the broken line in the parking lot. Many, many thanks to Derrick at the Napa, and his buddy Dan, for the help! Derrick had already closed the doors, and reopened so we could search for something that would work. Between his and Dan's help, we got the parts, repaired the line in the parking lot, and even bled the brakes. I got to look at Dan's truck, it's one of the nicest expedition-style rigs I've ever seen, very nearly 100% self-sufficient, in a small, unassuming package.

It was just amazing to find so many gracious and knowledgeable people in the middle of nowhere, and back in Moab...a day that could have been awful turned in to a great learning experience and we made a few new friends.

 

[Brett M]

Heyyyy...you're right. I wondered where that spur led, at the bottom of Bobby's Hole.

The Z-turn between grabens is indeed SOB Hill. I guess the Bobby's Hole hill climb remains unnamed.

SOB Hill has been nerfed since some of the photos I found from four years ago, much like the rest of the area. I wonder when they'll just pave the entire route .

Sounds like some interesting hikes in the area, we'll have to check them out next time we're south of Chesler.

Just thought I'd comment on this part. The Park service grades the hill out every now and then because it does wash out and get pretty ugly from time to time. I've been up one part of the year where it's smooth and 2wd, then gone back later that year and it's boulders and 4wd low with the lockers. Just depends


Now, as for your new pics, not fair at all. Looks like it was a good time down there. Seven Mile is a fun trail to run. I like heading out through Bartlett Wash when I'm done to get some fun in the sand

 

[devinsixtyseven]

The next day, we made our way out Potash Road to Long Canyon. It's marked by Jug Handle Arch.

Long Canyon turned out to be a great test of lockers, ingenuity, throttle, skill, and control. It looked like a few people had descended over the last few days, and we saw two vehicles coming down fairly early on...we're not certain if they tried to climb and turned, or came down from the top. Certainly only one or two vehicles had recently passed, a couple in an Avalanche entered and then turned back when they realized they'd descended it the previous day and a Jeep passed us headed down as well.

I had aired down to about 20# in front and 18# rear, not much, just enough to handle the chatter on the road, and we started up the canyon. As soon as it entered shade, the road was covered in snow and ice, and it was increasingly covered as we climbed.

We met a couple people headed up to climb, they thumbed for a ride and we continued on our way. We met another in their group slightly further up, and stopped for a moment. Upon restarting, I found that high range 4WD didn't provide enough control, low range didn't provide enough traction, and the rear locker alone wasn't enough to get moving without wheel spin. Again, so glad I got the RD90! With both ends spooled, we climbed fairly easily...slow and steady, unlocking the front in the switchbacks, locking again to navigate the clay mud, snow and ice that covered every inch of the climb to the top.

This rock offered a very brief respite from the snow.

Pucker Pass is just beyond this rock, where the canyon narrows and the route moves away from the edge and in to a slickrock slot. The "pass" was covered in an ice sheet, from runoff and people sliding down with locked brakes. After a few crawling attempts and one short run culminating in a stalled engine after a long slide and rollback off the top, I backed down to an area with good traction, locked both ends and shot up and over the ice flow. Finding traction on snow and ice on a steep uphill climb is no easy task, even with a pair of lockers. Chains would have made this easy rather than hair raising. Unfortunately, the camera batteries died just after the last picture.

The last terrain we encountered was a good mile or so of mud on the road from Pucker Pass to 313...almost the entire road was at least a half foot deep of sloppy red clay mud, often with standing water, and deeper in places. Both lockers helped the truck find traction on the All Terrains.

I'll be running Interco SXs soon, for exactly this sort of thing...a little of every terrain in a weekend. Grooved and siped, they'll be very similar to the Simex Extreme Trekkers. A set of chains will be part of the kit as well, if I can find some that fit.

-Sean

 

[bh4rnnr]

Sevenmile is a fun road. My first time on Wipe Out Hill during Cruise Moab 2005(I think), I noticed the lean portion of that road. Finally got around to seeing people on it during CM 07, no thanks to Mr.Brady and Paul May.

The Tundra is looking good and glad to see it back out on the trails. If your interested, My Dad, Kurt Williams, Paul May (maybe a few others) and myself are headed west this weekend to the southern portion of the Swell. We are going to met in Green River Friday the 22nd @ noon at Ray's, in downtown Green River.

Anyways, again thanks for the pics, helps me escape these concrete canyons.......

Sevenmile Rim eventually winds around Monitor and Merrimac Buttes, with a long section on tilted slickrock. It's not dangerous, just unnerving since the lean is to the driver's side and quickly drops away. None of the pictures were as exciting as it felt from the driver's seat.

This squeeze was wide enough by a few inches to let an LT-equipped Tundra pass...this is the "burnt toast" mentioned in the Wells book.

There's a bit of steep, tilted slickrock underneath Merrimac Butte, with a great view of Wipeout Hill. Again, the pictures aren't nearly as interesting as this felt from the driver's seat. The gentleman to photo left of my truck is walking the line in preparation for his own group driving this section.

Wipeout Hill is so close to this point I decided it had to be done. This turned out to be very good and very bad, as my rear softline had been rubbing the yoke at full compression on a series of whoops earlier.

I was holding this position for a photo when I felt a tiny "pop" in the brake pedal, followed by the horrible feeling of the brake pedal sinking to the floorboard. After standing on the ebrake pedal and alerting Katie to absolutely under no condition stand directly downhill of the truck, I was able to let the truck down in control with what pedal remained and assess the situation.

The braided cover was completely worn away where the yoke had rubbed, and there was a quarter inch slit in the hydraulic liner where it had burst when it was no longer supported by the cover. I was getting gloomy at the prospect of hunting down a new brake line in Moab on a Saturday evening or Sunday, and wondering how we'd get back to Denver if no line could be found. Someone in a group nearby mentioned they normally pinch the line with vise grips when this happens, fortunately we had a set and with a strap, some zip ties, a set of vise grips, and some electrical tape, we limped back to 313 from Wipeout Hill and in to Moab. The group of Jeeps we'd met earlier showed up, and were incredibly helpful and encouraging, plenty of kind words and advice to offer...I think they could tell this was a new situation for me, and most of them were very, very experienced with this and worse. The guys that suggested the vise grips were in the process of repairing a broken axle on a Jeep halfway up Wipeout Hill, thoroughly secured with makeshift wheel chocks, a second rig higher up, and a HiLift jack. I found out later they successfully repaired the axle and extracted the stuck rig.

The Napa in Moab stocks JIC(AN)-4 lines in varying lengths, and has AN-3 to AN-4 adapters. My truck has 10/1.0 metric lines, with adapters to the AN-3 lines, so with another pair of adapters we made it work, and we repaired the broken line in the parking lot. Many, many thanks to Derrick at the Napa, and his buddy Dan, for the help! Derrick had already closed the doors, and reopened so we could search for something that would work. Between his and Dan's help, we got the parts, repaired the line in the parking lot, and even bled the brakes. I got to look at Dan's truck, it's one of the nicest expedition-style rigs I've ever seen, very nearly 100% self-sufficient, in a small, unassuming package.

It was just amazing to find so many gracious and knowledgeable people in the middle of nowhere, and back in Moab...a day that could have been awful turned in to a great learning experience and we made a few new friends.

 

[upcruiser]

Sean, great writeup. Your truck is looking awesome! I'm planning on spending some time in Moab in April. I used to get there once or twice a year but last spring was a miss. I'm heading there this year with my Tundra though, not my cruiser. Will be my first road trip with it and am just looking to hitup some out of the way roads, camping and biking, biking, biking. Anyway, thanks for a little inspiration.