Southwest Chipotle Tour

Two of my friends and I explored the Western United States for two weeks.

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Our last day in the Grand Canyon.

Although heavily belated, I think this is the best way to bookend the national park side of the Southwest Chipotle Tour. A classic park, with classic vistas, and a classic parting shot.

Grand Canyon National Park encapsulates the spirit of the nation. Promise, risk, inspiration… all of these things are found in the Grand Canyon. They’re found in the Canyon, and in every other park we visited. There is something beyond words about the landscapes we romped around in. There’s a quiet sense of fulfillment, solitude, achievement, possibility, and more emotions than I have words for.

The National Park System is a national treasure and a national definition. We departed Grand Canyon and the Park System as a whole on June 8th, 2014, but we left behind memories, footprints, peeled skin, sweat, and so many Clif Bar wrappers. We left behind so many pieces of ourselves; we came through, and we shall return.

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Our second day in the Grand Canyon.

Hitting the trail around 10am, we hiked 3 miles in and more than 2,000 feet down the Bright Angel Trail to the aptly named Three Mile Resthouse. Highs that day broke 100 degrees, but with 4% humidity it didn't feel like much at all.

We kept to the shade behind the outhouse, soaked in the desert heat, and took in a tremendous view of the Canyon. Half way down, you start to get a sense for how truly immense the whole thing is.

The canyon's immensity is complimented by its air currents, which makes frisbee a very complex game to play.

Of note along the trail:

a middle-age man rescued by SAR helicopter

French tourists defying signs and death to capture photos on precipices

A couple with two infants, hiking up from Indian Gardens

Screaming squirrels

a lot of burrow shit.

That day was our last major hike. We wrapped up the hiking component of our trip with six miles, 4,200 feet total elevation change, and a frisbee to the eye. My eye.

Thanks for that, Frank.

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Our last morning in Zion, and our first evening in Grand Canyon.

The Towers of the Virgin illuminated at sunrise are magnificent. Almost spiritual- I understand the religious names now, something you don’t really comprehend until you see the Altar of Sacrifice bathed in the morning glow.

After we packed up at Zion, we drove to St. George for that sweet sweet In-N-Out Burger and that sickly-sweet gasoline. We then drove all the way back to Zion and through the Mount Carmel Tunnel, an Engineering Marvel more than One Mile long.

I’ve listened to that tour bus narration too many times, it’s bleeding into my reality.

Anyway, we then raced across the Grand Staircase to Lake Powell- a pointless, massive reservoir, the tombstone of a magnificent canyon- and then made our way into Arizona, Frank’s Homeland.

We stopped by the Desert View Watchtower to get some of that sweet sweet water (it is a desert, after all) and get those sweet sweet pictures. Not too many, though- we had to rush to Mather Point before sunset to dick around like the squad of high school clowns we are in the fading sunlight.

This album is one day, starting with sunrise in one canyon and ending with sunset in another. The dirt at my feet in Zion was the rock at the lip of the Grand Canyon- and the bottom of the canyon is 1.8 billion years old.

That’s really old.

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Day 2 in Zion.

We hiked to Observation Point, pretty much the highest/hardest frontcountry lookout in the Canyon district. 6,500 feet up and four miles out it's not nearly as bad as Half Dome, but the weather (the heat) and the switchbacks (oh sweet jesus) conspire to make it nearly as tough. We hiked through the joint of Lower and Middle Echo Canyon, the second slot canyon in two days- our first was Refrigerator Canyon- and made our way through the Navajo Sandstone slickrock at the boundary with the eastern district of the park. The crossbedding is beautiful and starkly different from the sandstone cliffs within the Canyon.

After summiting we made our way down and over to Hidden Canyon, which is just about as exposed as Angel's Landing. Chains are required; check road conditions.

There aren't any pictures of Hidden Canyon; it was so sandy and dusty I was afraid to take the camera out. I did get some on disposable camera, and those will be in their own post once I get the motivation to scan in 189 photos.

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Day One in Zion.

We did Angel's Landing, a 5.4 mile switchback laden overhyped trail to a promontory that rises more than 1,500 feet above the valley floor. Not quite rim, and not quite as epic as purported, but still a lot of fun and pretty technical. The last half miles is some serious scrambling aided by a chain, the serious part made so by the 500+ foot drops just off the trail- and I mean just off, about three feet away.

After we came down we went to all three Emerald Pools; the Middle was meh, the Upper was serene once the drunken bumpkins from Fresno left, and the lower was almost like Weeping Rock. Total distance hiked that day was around 10 miles.

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Our first afternoon in Zion.

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Our second day in Yosemite.

We hiked 16 miles, traversed 9,600 feet of elevation change, walked over innumerable stone stairs and switchbacks, saw two falls, and climbed the Cables. That’s the first hike over 6 miles I’ve ever done. It was killer and beautiful.

The Cables were not that bad actually and even easier to come down along. The climb up is an arm burner, and the climb down is a sole burner. But the view- it’s so worth it. Indescribable beauty, the pictures do it no justice.

We did the whole route in about 10 and a half hours; minus breaks, it took six up and three down. Good time for a group with a weak-lunged newbie.

Yose is beautiful. Go if you can.

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A few photos from Great Basin.

The drive there led us across the Loneliest Road in America, US 50 across the Great Basin of Nevada. We rushed frenetic across the barrenness for the park, encountering the beautiful desolation of the West.

At the Park we attempted to summit Wheeler Peak, a ~13,000 foot tall glacier-clad mountain punctuating the park’s skyline. We were forced down several hundred feet short of the summit by hurricane force gusts of cold air. Conveniently though, there were several wind shelters along the talus trail.

After dinner and Frisbee we attended an astronomy lecture at the Lehman Caves Visitor Center- remember, Half The Park Is After Dark! The skies at Great Basin are some of the darkest in the contiguous United States, only rivaled by Death Valley, Cedar Breaks and Natural Bridges National Monuments, and maybe Bryce Canyon. Thousands of stars were visible, satellites passed constantly, and the Milky Way was a starry cloud stretching across the entire sky. Also clearly visible were the headlights of inconsiderate visitors, who left the program early and sought to blind us all from the wonders of the night.

After Great Basin, we entered the Grand Staircase- Zion.

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Things that have lost relevance to us:

Heat (Death Valley)

Wind (Wheeler Peak)

Water (The Narrows)

Altitude (Wheeler Peak)

Exposure (Angel’s Landing/Half Dome)

Incline (Half Dome)

Distance (Half Dome)

Switchbacks (Grand Canyon)

Scale (Grand Canyon/Zion)

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Yosemite National Park.

These photos were taken the day of our arrival at Yosemite- May 26, 2014. I'll post a separate set of pictures later from our Half Dome hike.

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These are ten of the best photos taken at Death Valley. If requested I can post more.

Death Valley was horrifically hot. A dry heat, but an inescapable one at that. It was beautiful, and painful.

All of them, except for the Mesquite Dunes pictures, were captured on May 25, 2014. The Dunes picture was taken the following day.

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I accidentally posted this to my personal blog on Sunday lolwhoops

Well we made it to Death Valley, after seeing Petrified Forest and the Hoover Dam and sleeping at Red Rock Canyon.

It’s so hot. Oppressively, inescapably hot. Not humid, but just… hot. I’ll never complain about the weather again.

I’ll post some photos today if I can but the rest will come when we get somewhere with Wi-Fi.

Tomorrow- Yosemite.

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We made it through a monsoon, and Oklahoma, and even Texas, to our first stopover- Santa Rosa, NM.

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T-Zero.

We are on the road! We stop in Santa Rosa, NM to spend the night before heading all the way to Death Valley tomorrow night. Our primary mode of transportation: one 2002 Chrysler Town and Country loaded with gear and junk. Our primary food: Poptarts and Doritos. Our primary source of feels: Oklahoma.