Another Round of Grad School Vacations in Utah

Lost some chronology in the blog. Here's what we did for Christmas and spring breaks the first year of grad school.

Christmas break started with some house sitting and friends visiting town. An inversion made the air quality in the Salt Lake valley less than ideal. So we hiked up around Black Mountain. Clouds looked pretty neat.

Wasatch winter.

This is a good way to watch the sun go down.

When friends left town Julia and I had several days to ourselves before house sitting ended. We went skiing and played Scrabble.

This was a particularly good game. 

Then we headed to Zion for the first time. Time for a running camp. We started off with 14 miles on the La Verkin Creek Trail.

We ought to go camping here some day.

The lack of precipitation throughout Utah in general made it possible to run just about any trail in Zion.

Julia was pretty excited about this run/hiking in Zion thing.

That night we camped at what has become one of our favorite campsites. Little stream, far enough off the beaten path to be relatively quiet, free. Next day we had a lazy morning and then headed up the West Rim Trail for a 14 mile tour of Angel's Landing, the west rim proper, and some beautiful emerald pools.

Dynamite was probably pretty handy when
this trail was getting put in.

We wandered up to Angel's landing. Julia was a little hesitant. Not really excited about the exposure but she made it.

Worth the trip? Me thinks yes.

Back down. Thankful for the protection.

After getting off Angel's Landing we followed a beautiful trail that wound through some pretty cool sedimentary rock and up to the west rim of Zion Canyon.

Getting to the rim proper. 

It was a type of beautiful we'd never seen before. Very pleasant.

Someone returned that jacket to REI saying that it was
"too bright."

On the way back we checked out Emerald Pools.

After another great night of stars and rest we wandered another 14 miles up the east rim of Zion Canyon and over to Cable Mountain. Pretty neat view of Angel's Landing and the ridge we had been on the day before.

Whoa.

I love this part of the East Rim Trail.

Full moon in Zion Canyon.

The next day was our departure day. So we tracked down some slick rock trails on Gooseberry Mesa to loosen up the legs for the drive back. This was our first attempt at slick rock. Pretty interesting. Glad it was beginnerish. Regardless of how often we got off to push, it was fun.

Also when we rested, we got to look back at
the entrance to Zion Canyon.

Eventually came Spring Break. In between was skiing, some downhill and a lot of nordork. Both fun. Unfortunately in late January I hurt my butt which ended up making my knee hurt. I thought it had something to do with adductors but that was the best explanation Julia could come up with. (That was a joke). Bummer. We still were able to do all sorts of fun things.

In February one of Julia's nordork friends (who introduced us to the term "nordork") mentioned how much fun she had at something called the Equinox Ski Marathon. The idea is to see how far you or your team can ski or snow bike or run in 12 or 24 hours. Sounds fun so we signed up and started getting ready for it. Found a beautiful place to train for it up on the Mirror Lake Highway in the Uintas.

But my butt kept hurting my knee so I couldn't get after it the way I hoped. But we decided to make the most of spring break by biking ourselves silly in the Moab area. We got to go to places I had seen pictures of for years and dreamed of visiting. It was good.

Dead Horse Point!

Looking the other way at Dead Horse Point.

My dad joined us for the first 1.5 days of the trip south and dropped us off at the end of the road in Arches NP. Not before being a ridiculous tourist with us though and checking out an arch or two.

This looks a lot more like a delicate arch than a landscape one. 

We wandered 30 miles around the park and back to the entrance.

Yes! Bike above head!

Unsatisfied and still with daylight we switched over to mountain bikes and checked out Gemini Bridges. This 13 miles was a little slow. Sand and fatigue do that I guess.

Gemini Bridges Road is not smooth. Still fun.

Julia wasn't real impressed with our destination.
"That's cool. I'm hungry."

My dad had kindly sprung for two nights at a campsite just outside the entrance to Canyonlands and the Island in the Sky district. The next morning we were in the park and ready to see how many lookouts we could enjoy up there. 35 miles later we had seen quite a bit. And it was good.

Grand View Point! Bike above head!

Big place. Henry Mountains in the distance.

We stopped by the Green River Overlook to be mocked by the Maze District for our inability to get more than 2 miles from the car without turning around. We could see about 5 landmarks that I had excitedly planned to visit back on fall break. Blast.

We will visit Millard Canyon one day.

We brought some shoes along to be able to check out Upheaval Dome. Way back when I was trying to get freshmen students to enjoy earth science I stumbled across this strange hole in the middle of the desert in satellite photos. Turns out there is evidence for the great big hole being a result of both an impact crater and a salt dome. Neat.

Only seen in satellite photos prior. Now in real life!

Back to the car we relaxed with a beautiful view of the La Sal Mountains and the Schafer Trail, the road that can mark the beginning/end of a spectacular mountain bike adventure along the White Rim road.

Lunch tasted good here.

Yup. Adventuring in Utah with my wife is pretty dang good.

Next we headed for a free camp site up Kane Springs Canyon. This was a great place to spend time. Very quiet. On the way we saw a guy and gal pounding it up a relatively large uphill out of the canyon. Both had packrafts strapped to the bikes. Hmmm. Bikerafting. That sounds like a great idea.

"Hey, car up...er...down."
"Whatever. Don't drive off the cliff."

First attempt at ramen cooked on a fire. 

The next day we decided to see how far we could go heading north out of Moab along the Colorado River. Turns out it's beautiful up there.

Following the river.

A big pillar above Castle Valley.

The La Sal's behind the castle of Castle Valley.

Quit taking pictures. Let's rock this downhill
and go eat.

After a good 45 miles we were back in the car and headed back up Kane Springs Canyon. We were treated to another wonderful evening.

Living the life.

Looking towards Hurrah Pass. 

The next day was a spin and drive home. This time we headed out for 30 miles of flat, this time heading south along the Colorado.

Jughandle Arch or something like that.

Soon after spring break we were heading to West Yellowstone for the Equinox Ski Challenge. I was signed up for the 24 hour race and Julia for the 12 hour. This was a wonderful experience. There were about 70 racers or so, some individual, some in teams. The race was cheap if you signed up to volunteer for 2 hours. So that's what we did. Plus we got a bunch a free stickers like these.

Blue Moon Bears; Mimi Matsuda

Aurora Bearealis; Mimi Matsuda

Bison by Ski; Mimi Matsuda

The idea is to see how many laps can be done before the bell rings. There was a day nordic course, night nordic course, and snow bike course. I didn't think my butt/knee would be happy with skate skiing for 24 hours so I brought classic skis and rented a fat tire bike.

The gun went off and everyone took off entirely too fast. We rocked the first lap and Julia decided to take a short break. Many people had mentioned how temperatures were likely to get in the 40's in the afternoon so I thought I'd get while the getting was good. There would be plenty of time to rest when the trails turned soft. So on the second lap I went fast. Really fast. I was having one heck of a time until I lost control going around a corner and fell. Hard. I made a sound I hadn't heard since high school football. About 40 minutes into a 24 hour race I cracked my ribs pretty good. There were two of them on the bottom that didn't care much for getting poked.

Crud. Well, I paid money for this dang race and I am definitely going to try hard. Unfortunately deep breaths and double poling hurt a lot. I could avoid double poling but not deep breaths so much. No classic skiing today.

The weather was very nice. Kind of too nice. By noonish the trails were pretty mushy. But everyone pressed on. At one point Julia got to take a run with a spare fat tire bike with me. We took one lap and switched back to skis. Lots of getting off to push.

On the drive up I bought a pie to supplement the chips, caffeine gels, other stuff that was provided at the race. Good thing too.

Secret weapon: peach pie.

I skied until darkish and switched to the bike for the evening. This was probably not the best approach if I was going for the gold. The trails were pretty quick for skiing. Oh well. Biking didn't hurt as much. Also I had an iPod set up with some pretty inspiring music.

So I hopped on the bike and got after it for a while. Julia was stuck volunteering for me. She kindly recorded laps for folks until late into the night. Just so I could flail around the course all night. Around 2 or 3 AM I finished off the pie and took a 20 minute break in front of a big raging bonfire. Did I mention that this was a really fun race to be a part of?

Around 5 in the morning I took another break, changed back into ski boots, and tried to get as many laps in as possible before the cut off. I was happy to still be in motion. Thanks Vitamin I.

Not too many pictures of this adventure. We were either in motion, asleep, or Julia was volunteering 4 hours to cover for me. Julia did grab a picture at the end.

Announcer guy: "And here comes #23...uh...Joel Pierson!...
He looks pretty tired..."

When I came down to it Julia traveled 106.4 km in 12 hours and I got to 237.7 km in 24 hours. I almost beat a guy who looked to be pushing into his 60's pretty soon. Don't know exactly what I did to those two ribs but getting into bed hurt for a while. It was worth it.

The Equinox Ski challenge was cancelled in 2013 unfortunately. Sign me up for 2014. Hope I don't eat $%^* and get beat by an octogenarian.

Fall in Utah: Pretty Easy to Enjoy

October is extraordinary in Utah. Also, fall break!

Last year was a bit of a bummer with Julia's twisted ankle. So I thought I would try to redeem myself. Whoa. Guess I never described that on the blog either.

So Julia were going to complete an amazing packraft trip in Canyonlands NP and see most of the highlights of the Maze. Long story short, we didn't know how to get into the first canyon to start the trip. While we wandered around on the rim of Millard Canyon Julia sprained her ankle. Glad it wasn't worse.

So instead of a big ole loop we camped on the rim of Millard Canyon and relaxed. I found the entrance to the canyon so pretty soon I am going to give it another go. I hope.

Noted.

Tried to get down there but couldn't.

Settled for this view in the evening.

Bummer. 

Cleopatra's Chair

Then we checked out Horseshoe Canyon and Arches NP. Not a bad backup plan.

Horseshoe Canyon. Julia toughing out a bum ankle.

Lots of photographs taken here I gather.

Some things I remember from the trip:

• It's easy to have fun with Julia, even if not everything goes right. I knew that already but the trip was a pleasant reminder. 
• Julia is tough. She had a pretty swollen ankle and still did a couple of day hikes. 
• Millard Canyon is beautiful. I want to go back. 
• Rest is good. 
• The Utah desert is beautiful.

In general the 2011 fall break was awesome. But it was a little disappointing to have our plans shot to pieces. So in October 2012 I was ready to do something awesome and not let a planned four day trip end an hour away from the car.

So I put together all sorts of activities. More car camping than backpacking this time.

• Run/hike in Zion
• Run/hike in the Grand Canyon
• Road bike in Monument Valley
• Run/hike in Escalante

The first thing to do was go to a really fun wedding in a really beautiful place. Our friends Katie and Justin got married at Sundance Resort (of Robert Redford fame). It was neat and Julia was looking good.

That's my wife! She's awesome.

Then we headed south. 

Quick run in Kolob Canyon to this place.

Dinner spot with a view.

This was the hike part of the run/hike.

This was an awesome part of the run/hike. Other awesome
parts were observed.

Like this one.

We stayed in a friends house in St. George to prepare for what was going to be a pretty tough next couple days. Turns out Julia and I like camping near Zion NP better than staying in a house in St. George. Both good I guess.

Next up was the Grand Canyon adventure. I hadn't been to the north rim before and my experience on the south rim was limited to seeing an IMAX movie and being given a two hour window for hiking. Two hours! This time I got to determine the amount of time set aside for hiking and I didn't want to mess around.

Because the north rim looks kind of like this:

From the deck of the Grand Canyon Lodge.

We did a short hike to check out the canyon we were planning to descend into. Turns out it's pretty big.

Bright Angel Canyon 

Yeah, pictures don't quite cut it but it's clear more than two hours is necessary for me to get into a place like the Grand Canyon and feel like I understand it. Two months/years/decades may be more appropriate. But this trip we scheduled two days and we wanted to make the most of it. 

Plan: Run/hike to the river. The NP frowns upon this sort of behavior. In fact, sadly, signs indicate that hiking from the north rim to the Colorado River is not recommended, very strongly not recommended. The elevation change is close to 5,800 feet. But we were confident in our ability to stay hydrated and fed and get down there and back, especially in early October rather than July. At least I was confident. Julia need some convincing but eventually she was all in. 

We found some free camping just outside park boundaries but right on the rim of the Grand Canyon. This is one of the most enjoyable campsites I can remember. Watching the sun go down while eating dinner was wonderful. 

Look one way, see wife making dinner.

Look the other way, see sun setting over Grand Canyon.

I'd go back.

The next morning Julia and I attempted a new method for cleaning up camp. We had about a 40 minute drive to the trailhead and time was of the essence in the morning. So we got everything except sleeping bags/pads into the car the night before. In the morning we took the poles out of the tent, balled everything up, shoved it in the back and took off. I don't remember exactly but I think we went from asleep to driving in 3 or 4 minutes. We ate lots of breakfast on the way over. 

Temperatures appeared to be in the 40's when we started just after 6. Two full camelbacks, two full hand-helds, shot blocks, salt tablets, cliff bars, and poor man's power bars. We were ready to get after it, even though the friendly NP folks have taken every opportunity to tell us we will meet certain death if we do what we were attempting to do. I hope I don't have to get a helicopter rescue or something in a national park or else I will have to go back through this blog entry and delete part of the last sentence.

October colors.

We ran most of the way down. Sometimes it was important to walk in order to transition from completely enjoying myself and in awe of my peripheral vision to completely enjoying myself and in awe of everything I could lay my eyes on.

After an hour or so we saw this. Pretty neat.

Hard to pick out favorite moments but the picture below shows one of my favorite parts of the trail, both on the way down and on the way up. The trail drops off pretty good on the one side, goes up for quite a ways on the other. Spectacular place.

Easy to enjoy.

The trail drops pretty quickly in the first 5 or 6 miles then more or less flattens out for the last 8 or 9 to the river. We were early enough to get almost all the way to the river before the sun made it into the canyon.

Kind of flat and completely pleasant.

The canyon gets pinched a little which makes for good photo opportunities of Julia getting after it. Another favorite stretch of trail.

Julia getting after it.

Around another bend. Julia still getting after it.

And then we were at Phantom Ranch and the Colorado River.

I hear that rafts are another good way to experience the
Grand Canyon. I should look into that.

It was not in the 40's here. It was very warm, I would guess in the 80's. We had filled up with water about twice on the way down but had plenty extra when we stopped. The way up was shaping up to be pretty different. 

Lunch and soak along Bright Angel Creek.

I suffered from a little bit of stage fright in
the Phantom Ranch bathroom.

We drank ourselves silly (water) at the ranch and headed back up. Sun was in the canyon this time. Kind of hot down in there.

Sun on the trail.

The last water source is about 3,200 feet below the trailhead. Julia decided she was going to whip that trail up one side and down the other. I just tried to avoid getting dropped while taking pictures. She is pretty impressive.

Julia making up her mind to get to the top in a hurry.

Neat trail.

Getting towards the top in the late afternoon.

So we made it. It was fun. Julia wants to go back. I am signed up for that trip.

An inspiring van was parked at the trail head. I'd like to think our car is an adventuremobile but this one put the PW to shame. When the PW retires I hope to own a Hilda Van Outenfunhavin. In the meantime maybe the PW needs a new name.

Our car needs stickers of dancing animals.

Hilda Van Outenfunhavin knows that type II fun is still fun.

We saw a fellow who appeared to be doing rim-to-rim-to-rim from the south. He had a shoes, shorts, and a water bottle or two. Different approach than the camelback and long sleeves. Looking back that would have worked with all the water sources that were available. Plus it would drop about 10 or 12 pounds off our backs. Yeah, let's try that next time. Julia has to wear a shirt though.

Dinner and a repack.

And the week was only half over! The plan called for driving about 6 hours to Mexican Hat, UT. That was probably unwise planning but we made it. It helped to be wandering past the Vermilion Cliffs around sunset.

Pleasant drive, even with tired legs.

We got ourselves to Gooseneck State Park around 11 or so, pitched the tent and conked out. When we woke up we were greeted with quite the scene. The San Juan River was just below the parking lot.

The free camping areas might be prettier than the ones
that cost money.

A restful and scenic morning.

Road biking seemed like a good way to loosen the legs after our Grand Canyon adventure. So we took off. We spun the wheels for a while, stopping often to say wow.

Good day for a bike ride. I feel fresh as a daisy. How about you?

Yup. Feeling good.

That's interesting how neat that is.

Some monuments.

A friendly fellow ridiculous tourii was kind enough to take
a photo for us.

We saw a coyote along the road in Monument Valley. But he was pretty quick so no photo evidence was obtained. He looked like a lot like this:

Sans roller skates though.

We hopped in the car for another leg of driving. But before we got too far, I was interested in seeing why Mexican Hat is called Mexican Hat.

Julia was not interested in seeing why Mexican
Hat is called Mexican Hat.

This drive was also beautiful and we had daylight for it. Should we need to camp along Highway 95 someday there are plenty of pleasant looking spots.

Getting up onto Cedar Mesa from the Valley of the Gods.

Scouting a takeout for the Dirty Devil River for future reference.
Heck yes we came back and floated that sucker.

Where Lake Powell begins.

We headed up and around Boulder Mountain. This place is extraordinary in October. We had tremendous views of Capitol Reef NP and the Henry Mountains.

A monocline and a laccolith.

Just missed the aspens in all their glory. This worked too.

Looking toward the Grand Staircase-Escalante National
Monument from Boulder Mountain.

At this point every thing had gone according to the plan. Next up was to head down Hole-in-the-Rock Road to the Egypt trailhead, wander down to the Escalante, and check out Neon Canyon. We got to the Egypt trailhead around dusk and past a really nice looking free campsite with a fire ring and everything. I almost stopped. Probably should have.

Instead we bounced down towards the trailhead as far as our PW would take us and set up camp. There we had a wonderful campfire on a rock with pleasant benches to sit on. At this point we started to notice some atmospheric instability. We saw a storm or two roll across. No worries, far away.

We fell asleep and woke up to the pitter patter of rain. Hmm. Slot canyon trip is out. We ought to head back to the road. That's ok. We heard Bryce Canyon NP is a good place to spend time too.

Then things sort of hit the fan. It started raining harder and the washes were flooding. The PW made it through a little stream with a little excitement but no problem. Then came one that was a bit more substantial. Gave it a shot. However this one wasn't going to let us pass. I don't know what Julia recalls from this attempted crossing. Over the course of about 6 seconds I remember heading in, realizing we weren't going to get across, putting the car into reverse as quickly as possible, giving it gas, not feeling it move, saying "God please help us get out of here" out loud, cleaning out the carbon the old fashion way (putting it to the floor more or less), still not feeing it move, feeling the tires catch, and backing out with urgency.

Yeesh. We backed up onto high ground and let reality settle in. We had gotten trapped by a flash flood and were at the mercy of the weather. When it stopped raining we would be able to get out, but not before the road was passible.

Julia finished a book and I got homework done. It rained all day. Hailed occasionally too. We stayed in the car for more or less the entire day. Occasionally we got out and checked things out. A larger wash just over the hill was also ripping along and a two foot bank replaced the road on the opposite side. Not awesome. When the rain let up in the evening we got our tent set up and fell asleep.

The next day it wasn't raining. Instead it was looking downright beautiful. We were glad.

Not sure why the clouds did that over the cliffs but it was
fun to look at.

Then we heard the welcome sound of heavy machinery working on the wash just over the hill. A friendly fellow wearing a cowboy hat was fixing the road. Wonderful to see.

Hard to see the hat but it's there. 

He didn't even make fun of us for getting stuck. Or if he did I don't remember. We waited around for the sun to dry things out a bit and headed back to the main road.

Checking out where I want to put the tires on the newly
cleared wash. Thanks cowboy.

Good job car.

At this point we were pretty tired. We headed back to town and got a car wash. Large chunks of gravel were tucked up inside the bumpers. I imagined what was going on when I shoved the car into reverse while we were sliding around in the wash. Then I felt extraordinarily thankful.

We got to Bryce Canyon NP and made some lunch. We were pretty content to walk from the car to the lookouts and then eat food. That was about it. 

Wow! That is beautiful!

Sure is. Want to go hiking?

Heck no! I just want to sit up here and eat.

Sweet. Me too. 

Not sure what to do for fall break this year. It seems likely I'll be having some sort of fun in an awesome place with my lovely wife. No flash floods. But fun and awe? You betcha'.