Bob Myers and I spent an entire month in Chile on vacation this winter. Bob of course is retired, and I managed to cobble together a month's paid vacation out of the dregs of my 2018 vacation days and half of my 2019 vacation days. We visited the central part of Chile, driving from Santiago south to Puerto Montt. We had a great time, and I took an absurd number of photos.

This post is an adaptation of my travel diary, by now heavily rewritten. I've tried to cut it down to size, but feel free to skip over stuff to find the interesting bits.

Some prefatory notes

On roads:

There's one long freeway that runs north and south through the central part of Chile, Ruta Cinco / Route 5. Driving on it is hair raising and exhilarating. There seem to be very few accidents (we did see one spectacular pile-up), but there are a lot more hazards than you might expect. Pedestrians cross the freeway in rural areas by running across all 4 or 6 lanes. Some people ride horses on the shoulders. Others ride bicycles on the median. You can come around a corner at 120 kph / 72 mph and meet someone trying to get their ancient sedan to the next exit with a flat tire, doing maybe 15 kph (happened to us on the way to Rancagua). There are fruit stands right on the shoulders, selling sandias (watermelons), duraznos (peaches) and tomates (tomatoes). There are also restaurants and little grocery stores. Onramps and offramps are very short, so you always have to look for very slow traffic exiting or entering. Traffic seems to be divided among speed demons (a small percentage), law abiders (who drive the 120 kph speed limit), and trucks / buses, who by law must drive at most 90 or 100 kph. The result is a lot like roller derby, where clots of traffic led by wheezing buses or little 1970s era Datsun minivans are attacked by brightly colored late-model pick-up trucks.

Chilean drivers are surprisingly polite, especially in comparison to their neighbors in Argentina, and especially when you get out of Santiago. Cars will actually stop to let you get into traffic or make a turn, which is a huge help on the narrow streets. Taxis are an exception to this rule, although I did see some polite taxi drivers too. Local buses can also be rude — watch out for their lane changes.

The belt freeways in Santiago are toll roads with electronic tag readers — no cash tolls. Be sure to rent a car with a transponder.

On money:

Both Bob and I had given our respective credit unions a heads-up about our travel to Chile, but my ATM card worked and Bob's did not. Note that our credit cards did work. Bob brought American cash and changed it to pesos.

While we were there, the exchange rate was about 680 Chilean pesos (CLP$) to the US dollar. Our rule of thumb for converting peso prices to dollars was to divide by 1000 and multiply by 1.5.

You need to carry cash for tolls on Ruta 5. I've heard complaints about the prices, but I didn't think they were that bad — about CLP$2500 at toll plazas and CLP$600 at minor exits. I did have a total brain fault at one toll plaza on Ruta 5 that didn't take money at all: instead, you're supposed to swipe the bar code from your previous toll payment under a bar code reader. I was so flummoxed by this that I had to put on the flashers and ask for help (which did not exactly make me popular!).

When you enter Chile, the police at the airport will give you a little receipt that looks trivial. Absolutely do not lose this receipt, which has PDI marked on it in big letters. You need this receipt to prove to hotel clerks that you are exempt from VAT (value-added tax) on hotel stays. Also, carabineros (police) will ask to see this receipt if you get pulled over, or if you try to cross into Argentina. Keep it with your passport.

On English and Spanish:

There are many English speakers in Chile, but we encountered a number of situations where nobody at an office or a store spoke any English. I used to think that my Spanish pronunciation was decent even if my vocabulary was very limited, but I had a rude awakening in Chile — I had to really work to be understood in Spanish. Conversely, I had a lot of trouble understanding the local conversational Spanish. I could understand the Spanish that I heard on TV (more or less), and I could read signs and menus. Your mileage may vary.

Chile has its own names for many fruits and vegetables. Even if you know some Spanish, you'll be guessing at least some of the time.

In Chile, a laguna is not a lagoon, in spite of Google Translate; it's just another word for a lake, usually but not always a lake that's smaller than a lago.

On Airbnb:

We booked a number of units through Airbnb. These places were cheaper than staying in hotels, but a number of them were also pretty funky. If you aren't prepared to survive plumbing issues or flaky wifi, stick to the hotels. Bob and I did just fine — it's better than camping!

On summer weather:

The area from Santiago down to Los Ángeles was dry when we were there. It reminded me of California summers. From Pucón on south, we had occasional rain days. We just had to work around them.

Day 0: Wednesday, 12/19: Departure

I flew on American and Bob flew United. American had changed my flight arrangements a couple of months earlier and had shortened my connection in DFW to just 55 minutes. My flight from SLC was 20 minutes late, so I had to sprint to get to the gate for the Santiago flight. I made it with literally a minute to spare.

I had spent a fair amount of effort trying to find flights that had reasonable connection times, and I was very happy that I had found itineraries where I would spend 2 hours or so in DFW on both the outbound and inbound flights. It wasn't really worth it.

Day 1: Thursday, 12/20: Santiago

I arrived in Santiago before Bob and did the paperwork for the car rental at Europcar. I had rented through Lys Rent-a-Car; for an extra US$700, they guaranteed 24-hour roadside assistance plus phone assistance in English. We got a VW Tiguan hatchback, automatic transmission with 4WD — a very nice car, similar to a Subaru. Bob and I had a little trouble getting in touch after Bob arrived since my cell phone didn't work and Bob went out through the domestic terminal rather than the exit from the international terminal, where I was waiting, but it all worked out in the end.

We drove into the city on the Costanera Norte. This expressway runs underneath the bed of the Río Mapocho in places, which is a bit disconcerting. We got to the apartment rental on Calle Merced in downtown Santiago and found that there was no place to park while checking in, so I circled the block while Bob secured a room key and a parking pass.

After we got settled, we took a walk across downtown to get a PDI (Policía de Investigaciones) certificate for Bob, since he didn't get one when coming through customs, and you need one in order to get your VAT waived at hotels and apartment rentals. We found a PDI office and after some confusion due to my poor Spanish, we managed to get a certificate.

We then walked further across town to the Instituto Geográfico Militar (IGM) office on Calle Dieciocho to buy topo maps. The IGM is the equivalent of the USGS in Chile for maps; they have beautiful, detailed 1:50,000 quadrangle maps. Some quads are still pending updates, but most of the ones that we were interested in are fully updated and really well maintained.

We had dinner at Chipe Libre in Lastarria. They do pisco flights — mmm. We got back to the apartment in time to see a smoggy sunset on the Andes from the 17th floor. I took a few photos.

go to the Santiago gallery

Day 2: Friday, 12/21: Cajón del Maipo

The next day, both Bob and I were still recovering from the long flight on the day before. Even with our late start, we were still determined to do a hike, so we set out for Monumento Natural El Morado in the Cajón del Maipo, at the southeast end of Santiago. The Santiago traffic was horrid, but we did eventually make it to Puente Alto and into the canyon.

We stopped to take some pictures at Cascada Queltehue, a pretty waterfall along the road. The turn-off for the hike was just a couple of kilometers further down the road, at Baños Morales. It was a little difficult to figure out where the parking area for the hike was; it's not very obvious, and we drove by it initially and had to turn around. We parked, put on sunscreen, adjusted our packs and set out.

We were stopped almost immediately by a CONAF employee. (CONAF is the Chilean equivalent to the Forest Service and the Park Service in the States.) You're not permitted to start on the trail after 1 PM, and it was 1:30 PM, and that was that. There is even a sign describing this schedule at the trailhead. Oof.

We drove back down the canyon, then up the spur road to Embalse El Yeso (Gypsum Reservoir), a big lake high up in the Andes. The road is paved most of the way, but turns to dirt just before the dam. The road goes past the dam and then along a cliffside, where it has been heroically blasted from the rock. Eventually the road comes out onto a broad glacial valley with views to the highest peaks.

Bob and I had lunch (ham sandwiches) by the side of the road. We were each visited by a medium-sized yellow-and-black bird; I'm not a birder, but looking at the online birding resources, I'm guessing that it was a Sicalis or Phrygilus. It was very friendly. Somewhat less friendly was a canid that looked rather like a coyote with longer fur. It hung out at a distance, and I suspect that it was accustomed to checking out picnickers' trash. I think that this must have been a culpeo.

On the way back to the dam, we discovered that the narrow cliff-side road was regularly traversed by huge orange Mercedes dump trucks. There is a mine above the reservoir, and I assume that the trucks were headed there. We had to squeeze right next to the wall or right next to the cliff edge, with a big drop down to the milky water.

We got back a bit late for our reservation at Bocanáriz restaurant in Lastarria, but they were still able to fit us in. We'd been to Bocanáriz back in February 2014, and I was eager to try their affordable wine flights again. Bob persuaded them to do a pisco flight.

go to the Cajón del Maipo gallery

Day 3: Saturday, 12/22: Parque Cordillera Yerba Loca

We managed to get an earlier start, and drove up the Farallones ski resort road to Parque Cordillera Yerba Loca. This park is run by a municipality rather than the federal government, but the scenery is still wonderful. The road to get there is fairly exciting — you have to go up a series of very tight switchbacks on a very narrow paved road. We kept hoping that we wouldn't meet a garbage truck headed down the hill; as it turns out, the worst problem was the number of bicyclists who were taking the challenge of climbing this steep hill.

When we got to the park, we learned that the trail is officially closed (of course). A huge landslide high in the canyon apparently took out a chunk of trail and is threatening to bring down more debris. Unofficially, the park workers just wanted to know what the conditions on the trail are actually like right now, and for us to take extra care on the bad section. We parked and cheerfully climbed over the barrier at the start of the trail, and headed up.

We got maybe 8 km in before we gave up. Bob's feet were hurting and his insoles needed adjustment. The waterfalls were visible a kilometer or two away, and that was good enough. It was interesting to see that the bottom of the valley was cut through granite, while the higher terrain was lava. We saw some condors cruising along the cliffs. The water in the stream was tinted yellow with sulfur; the park workers advised us against drinking any of it.

Back in Santiago, Bob picked up a SIM card at WOM to use for local data and calls. My Spanish was once again incomprehensible, but we got by with mime and gestures. It turned out that we picked a plan that doesn't support international calling or texting — oops. Still, it was great to be able to use Google Maps without paying US$10 per day to Verizon.

My own cell phone was supposed to work in Chile, and in fact I'm pretty sure that it did work when I visited back in 2014. I have an ancient 2G-only Motorola Razr flip phone. It turns out that Chile has decommissioned all of its 2G support, so while my phone was able to contact the carriers, it couldn't roam on them. Apparently I need to upgrade to a 4G flip phone!

Dinner at Quitral in Lastarria. I remember that it was fine, but no details.

go to the Yerba Loca gallery

Day 4: Sunday, 12/23: Santa Rita Winery

It was time to head to our next booking, in Rancagua. I was eager to visit Rancagua because I had heard that there were a number of good wineries in the Alta Cachapoal region, and the hiking in the Cachapoal Valley looked pretty cool.

It turns out that wineries in Chile tend to be closed on Sundays (and holidays). We did find one huge winery that was open — Viña Santa Rita in Buin. We missed our chance to go on an English-speaking tour of the winery, so we settled on trying a flight of reds in the tasting room. Afterward, we visited the on-site museum. We were amazed at the wonderful indigenous pottery, weaving, metalwork and more, with examples from Chile and Peru and other South American countries.

Our reservation was at the Hotel Manquehue. We had some difficulty figuring out how to get to it; it turns out that it occupies floors 4 and up in a tower that also functions as a food court and shopping mall, with a footbridge over Avenida Einstein to a Lider supermarket. (This is where I finally realized that Walmart had bought the Lider supermarket chain. The blue branding and yellow asterisks should been a clue; d'oh.)

The room had a lovely view eastward to the Andes.

go to the Santa Rita Winery gallery

Day 5: Monday, 12/24: San Pedro Winery

I was feeling sick on Monday, and not up for hiking. In the afternoon I decided that I was feeling well enough to visit wineries, but it was Christmas Eve and everything was closed. We drove out to the Viña San Pedro winery, and went in since the gate was open. The winery itself was quite closed, but the views were nice. We realized on the way out that the security guard had accidentally left the gate open — I smiled at him and did my best impression of a stupid tourist, and he let us go through.

We took a detour on the drive back to Rancagua and drove up the Río Cachapoal to the Termas de Cauquenes hot springs resort, then up to the small town of Coya. From Coya we headed up the hill with the idea of driving the road to the ghost town of Sewell. That's where we learned at a security checkpoint that the Sewell road is strictly off limits to private drivers — apparently the only way to reach Sewell (if you're not a mine employee) is to take an organized tour.

go to the San Pedro Winery gallery

Day 6: Tuesday, 12/25: Our Christmas Adventure

I was feeling a bit better and I really wanted to do a hike in the upper Cachapoal valley. My goal was to hike up the Río Paredones valley, but I was concerned about the ford at the start of the hike, so I had a back-up plan to do a hike up a side canyon in the Río Blanco valley, which is right next door.

It was a bit of an adventure just getting to the Río Paredones trailhead. We had to stop at a police checkpoint, describe our destination using broken Spanish and mime, and leave our passports (!). The road climbed a hill in many hair-raising switchbacks, and I was glad that we didn't encounter any trucks on the way. The road services a hydropower pipeline that dates from the early 20th century and is made of California redwood held together by rusty iron hoops. Eventually the road pops out to a breathtaking view of the Río Paredones valley.

We parked and walked over to the Río Blanco to see how difficult the ford was going to be. We could see one channel of the braided river, where the water looked swift and maybe thigh deep, but it seemed likely that there was another, bigger channel further on. This was confirmed by a man we met who was walking his two small dogs on the road: he told us that the first ford was knee deep, and the second one was chest deep. Oh well — it was early summer and the rivers were running high.

We then drove along the Río Blanco road to a set of cabins, where there was a closed gate. We talked to another man here, and as best I could understand, the copper company had completely closed the Río Blanco valley to public access. The on-line description that I'd read had said that the gate was usually open, but apparently it is now always closed. We're screwed.

As we retrieved our passports from the cops, Bob asked if I had a back-up to my back-up. I said that I did — we could drive a dirt road up the Las Leñas valley and hike past a lake to a basin surrounded by 4000m peaks. I hadn't done much research about the area, but it looked nice on the map, and sometimes those hikes can be real winners.

The road turned out to be further away than I thought, and also fairly rough. It was bladed and blasted on switchbacks up a steep hill, after which it leveled out and contoured along the side of the valley. The valley really was gorgeous, and the Tiguan handled the rough road pretty well.

About halfway up the valley, we came up behind a couple of 2WD vehicles that were having a pretty rough time on the loose rock and steep slopes. They weren't interested in letting us pass, and they were very slow getting through the harder sections. These two slow vehicles eventually came up against an even slower 2WD vehicle that was stuck at a very rough spot where a stream had dumped boulders across the track. We waited for a while for these folks to give up, but after a while, we just pulled out our lunches and watched them struggle futilely. We then turned around and headed back down.

We'd gone maybe a kilometer when a light came on on the dash indicating low tire pressure. I checked the tire pressure and the front right tire was low. We drove another half kilometer and it became clear that we weren't going to make it back to the main (dirt) road at the Río Cachapoal. I found a level spot and parked off to the side, and we made preparations to install the spare.

The spare turned out to be a donut spare, marked with lots of warnings about not driving too far or too fast. It was going to have to do. We blocked the wheels and pulled out the toolkit. After we jacked the car up a little bit, we took a look at the lugnuts. What I'd thought were lugnuts were actually little rubber caps — a wire-like tool in the kit removed them. Underneath were 5 regular lugnuts and a locking lugnut.

I'd never dealt with a locking lugnut before. I pulled out the Tiguan's manual and my Spanish dictionary, and tried to find out what to do. The manual was actually fairly clear: there is an adapter in the toolkit that fits onto the tire wrench, and it lets you unscrew the nut like the other nuts.

Except there was no adapter in the toolkit. The tools reside in little indentations in a styrofoam pad that sits in the well surrounding the spare. The indentation that was supposed to contain the adapter was empty.

We checked the upper and lower glove compartments. We checked the center console. We checked the seat pockets and the door pockets. We checked under the seats, front and back. We turned the styrofoam pad upside down and shook it. We checked in the engine compartment. No adapter.

The guys in the 2WD pick-ups drove by and wanted to be helpful, but they had no lugnut adapters and had no room in their jam-packed vehicles for passengers. Eventually Bob and I put our packs on and started walking down the road.

Mistake number one: I didn't grab the rental agreement from the glove compartment. Mistake number two: we didn't carry all of our gear with us, failing to realize that we might not see it again. Mistake number three: I discovered after walking for a kilometer that I had no more water in my hydration bladder. (I guess mistake zero was renting a car with locking lugnuts and no tire wrench adapter.)

It wasn't actually that far back to the Río Cachapoal bridge, maybe 3 km. There were lots of picnickers around, and I figured that we could probably hitch a ride, either up to the nearby Hotel Noi Puma Lodge or down the valley. We just needed to get cell reception for Bob's phone so that we could call Europcar and take advantage of the 24/7 roadside assistance.

Just across the bridge, Bob found a couple of guys barbecuing chicken pieces and drinking beer. They were very sociable, and even though Bob doesn't speak Spanish, he managed to strike up a friendship using mime and English words. We hung out with them for a while, but I wanted to get out to the main road, where I figured we'd have better luck hitchhiking, so I dragged Bob away.

As it turned out, Bob was convinced that we could get a ride from these two guys — he said that they were a bird in the hand, and he had a connection with them. I was more concerned about the numerous empty liter beer bottles at their little campsite, and I felt that we could get a better deal at the main road. In the end, we turned around and went back.

The two guys were happy to see us. They gave Bob a cold liter bottle of Heineken and invited us to join them. I used my garbled Spanish to try to explain our situation, and they said that they were planning to leave by 4 PM anyway. In fact, we could leave earlier if we wanted, as soon as Bob finished his beer.

Bob actually wasn't that enthusiastic about the beer, and it was a bit of a comedy of errors as I tried to hint to Bob that he needed to drink up before these guys finished yet more bottles of their own. I tried to help — I don't like beer at all, but I was out of water and it was certainly cold.

When we were finally ready to leave, I counted 7 empty liters, not counting Bob's bottle. We threw the trash in the back of the guys' pick-up, and Bob and I squeezed into the jump seat with our packs in our laps. We took off in a cloud of dust toward Rancagua.

In fact, we bounced at such a high speed down the main dirt road that we caught the attention of the carabineros (police), who pulled us over. Everyone, including Bob and I, had to show ID. The carabineros weren't particularly interested in us after checking us for our PDI papers, so we waited in the car while they separately chatted with the driver and his friend. The driver got some sort of abbreviated sobriety test, which he appeared to pass, much to my amazement.

After that, we did drive a bit slower. The driver and his friend broke out another liter of Heineken to celebrate their narrow escape. When we reached the junction of the Río Pangal with the main Río Cachapoal, we turned off on a side road and began climbing a hill. The driver was a bit sloppy on the curves, and we went off the shoulder a couple of times; we hit a rock once, but it didn't do any (additional) damage.

It turned out that they wanted to show us a nice viewpoint over the Cachapoal Valley at the top of the hill. We stopped, and Bob and I got out and took photos. We did some fun arm-in-arm buddy photos, and the guys pulled out another cold beer to celebrate. I did wonder whether we took a back road at least partly to avoid more encounters with carabineros.

We continued down the west side of the hill on more switchbacks. I was a bit relieved when we reached pavement near Termas de Cauquenes. On the other hand, that was also the scene of the most startling part of the drive. A bus that we were tailgating slammed on its brakes when a car tried to park on the shoulder in a busy spot and the bus couldn't get around it. We all jerked forward as our driver slammed on our own brakes. Fortunately the bus's brakes and tires were pretty bad, and we all slid to a stop inches from each other, in a cloud of nasty-smelling black smoke.

When we got to the hotel, we celebrated again by taking buddy photos. Bob wanted to offer the guys some cash, and I tried to persuade them that it was gas money — they cheerfully refused to accept it, as I expected they would. I realized right away that we had another great travel story...

Of course the story wasn't over. Back in our hotel room, we called the English speaking agent who had arranged our car rental, and he in turn called up Europcar to explain the situation. We were on the phone frequently, trying to convince everyone that the car was undrivable and was in a location where it couldn't be winched onto a trailer. Europcar promised us a replacement vehicle and told us that they would be in touch tomorrow. The extra money for English language assistance turned out to be well worth the expense.

go to the Christmas Adventure gallery

Day 7: Wednesday, 12/26: Replacement Car

So we had no car and we had to check out of the hotel. Our next stop was in San Fernando, 55 km to the south in the Colchagua Valley.

We ended up waiting around all day for a replacement car. I have a strong suspicion that the Europcar guys sent a tow truck and trailer up the Cachapoal Valley, just to see whether we were telling the truth. In any event, they didn't retrieve the Tiguan, and they didn't come up with a replacement vehicle until about 4 PM. We took a taxi over to the Europcar garage, where we discovered that no one spoke English. After I realized that my “Spanish” was basically incomprehensible to everyone there, we called up our English speaking agent again and he got things straightened out for us.

Europcar gave us a diesel Toyota HiLux 4WD pickup with a manual transmission. This was a “higher category” (more expensive) than the Tiguan, and much, much larger. It had less interior space, however; oh well. When we got back the hotel to collect our bags, I realized that this monster was going to be a serious pain to park, and so it was, for the rest of the trip.

We made it to San Fernando by 5:45 PM, which I thought was a pretty good time. San Fernando is not a tourist town — its neighbor to the west, Santa Cruz, gets all of the attention. San Fernando may be rough at the edges, but it's also pretty lively — the streets and sidewalks were crowded with shoppers on an pleasant evening. Bob and I had dinner in town at a tiny restaurant named La Trilogía. They didn't have every dish on their small menu, but we appreciated their effort, and we got a decent view down to the main street, peering through a maze of overhead wires.

Day 8: Thursday, 12/27: Colchagua

I had originally planned the day in San Fernando as a break from hiking, but due to illness and adventures, we were getting more breaks than hikes. Since we were also waiting to find out when we could get our gear back, we were also a bit reluctant to stray too far. Hence we drove around to a few wineries.

We headed out to Santa Cruz and stopped at the Estampa winery. The building was fancy, but the tasting room was cozy and more modest. Estampa prides itself on its blends. I really liked their viognier / chardonnay blend and I picked up a bottle.

Our next stop was the Laura Hartwig winery. This winery was much more traditional in style, and even had an unused polo ground in front. Of the wines that we tasted, I really liked their petit verdot, and I bought a bottle of it. I've never seen a straight petit verdot elsewhere; LH's treatment was very dark and rich.

With time on our hands, I suggested that we drive the loop to the north and visit the Vik Winery. This side trip took much longer than I expected, with slow going on many little rural roads. We eventually managed to find the winery, and the architecture was as spectacular as advertised. We walked around the water sculptures at the main winery building. I was curious about the retreat at the winery, which looked like a gold and silver flying saucer perched on a hill, but it became apparent that like the San Pedro Winery, the Vik Winery was actually closed and we had managed once again to drive onto the grounds of a winery through a gate that had been left open accidentally.

We checked in with Europcar and the Tiguan was still up on the mountain. Too bad. We drove on to our next stop, the city of Talca. Talca was very badly damaged by the earthquake of 2010 and signs of the quake are still fairly obvious. A number of buildings in the downtown area are abandoned and collapsing, with smashed windows, big cracks and graffiti. On the other hand, the town seems to be rebounding, and many buildings have obviously been repaired or rebuilt.

We were reluctant to drive even further from San Fernando without getting our gear back from the Tiguan, and we were getting especially concerned because the weekend was coming up and we expected Europcar to close through Tuesday for the long New Years holiday...

go to the Colchagua gallery

Day 9: Friday, 12/28: Parque Nacional Radal Siete Tazas

We were once again reluctant to go somewhere and miss out on a notification from Europcar that our gear had been retrieved, but it was just too nice a day to sit around. We decided to drive out to Parque Nacional Radal Siete Tazas in the Andes foothills northeast of Talca. Even the best route into the park requires you to drive 22 km on dirt. The HiLux performed very well; the clearance was admirable and the 4WD kept us from sliding around on mud.

The first real sight when you enter the park is the Cascada Velo de la Novia (Bridal Veil Falls). We took a few photos here and continued up the road. We crested a rise and guess what: Bob's phone got a cell signal and delivered a text message from Europcar saying that they had retrieved the Tiguan and we could pick up our gear if we could make it to Rancagua by closing time at 6.

I desperately wanted to see the highlight of the park, just a few kilometers up the road, but now we had a serious deadline. I sped up to the visitor center, paid the fee and sprinted to see the Seven Cups, a series of gigantic potholes in a narrow basalt gorge. I sprinted back and jumped in the truck, and we hurtled down the dirt road. The 4WD really paid off here.

That wasn't the end — we still had to drive miles of rural roads full of tractors and buses and bicycles, then join rush hour traffic on Ruta 5. But we made surprisingly good time, and by some miracle we arrived at the Europcar garage on the stroke of 6 PM. The Tiguan was parked just inside the doors, and all of our stuff was exactly where we'd left it. Success!

go to the Siete Tazas gallery

Day 10: Saturday, 12/29: Cascadas del Maule

One of the hikes that I had been looking forward to was the Cascadas del Maule trail, a tour of several waterfalls along the upper Río Maule. You can see some of the waterfalls from the Río Maule road, but the trail runs along the gorge and gets you up close to the best stuff. The scenery along the road is fine too, and the road is paved all the way to the Argentine border.

The trail lived up to its billing — I took 75 photos. Yikes.

We got some great views of the famous Cascada Invertida (Inverted Waterfall). I hadn't really understood the name until we got right across from it and I realized that the fierce wind blasts up the valley every single day.

After doing the hike, we drove up the road with the idea that we might get a look at the Laguna del Maule, a large crater lake that is the source of the Río Maule. However, there is a customs station before you reach the lake, and we decided that we didn't want to struggle to explain to the agents that we weren't actually planning to drive into Argentina.

go to the Cascadas del Maule gallery

Day 11: Sunday, 12/30: Kidney Stone

Yes, I passed a kidney stone. I wrote up a long description of my ordeal but decided it was TMI. Ask me if you really want to know what it was like.

I'm going to be much, much more careful on subsequent trips to avoid getting dehydrated...

Day 12: Monday, 12/31: Constitución

I was in no shape for hiking, but I was feeling much better. By afternoon I was ready to drive around and check out wineries.

Once again, however, I'd managed to choose a really bad day to find wineries that would be open for visitors. Nobody really wants to be open on New Year's Eve. After striking out a couple of times, we asked someone where we might have better luck — they suggested Viña Balduzzi in San Javier, south Talca. Balduzzi was indeed open for tasting, and it was moderately busy.

Another winery that had been suggested to us was located off to the west in the coastal hills. It was closed, of course, but we decided that as long as we'd gone that far, we might as well drive to Constitución, a town on the coast at the mouth of the Río Maule. We made it there in reasonable time in spite of the fact that we had to stop every half hour so that I could take a leak in the bushes.

I was a bit surprised to find that the low mountains in the coast range are covered extensively by tree farms. There's very little native forest visible from the road — we saw instead huge groves of pines and eucalyptus. Even more surprising were the vast areas of blackened and burned trees, a product of recent monster wildfires.

Constitución, like Talca, had suffered badly in the big 2010 earthquake. It was interesting to see how the city had adapted along the waterfront, where the tsunami had wiped out neighborhoods. We drove out to Piedra de las Ventanas (Window Rock) on the furthest point of land on the south side of the estuary. It was windy and chilly, and we could smell the stench of the huge pulp plant just across the road.

Returning late to Talca, we discovered that the hotel restaurant was reserved for a pricey New Years Eve party. We walked around the neighborhood looking for restaurants that were open, but it was a wasteland. We'd given up and were heading back when we passed a Chinese restaurant with lights on. It was the Perla Azul (Blue Pearl) Restaurant, and they were open. We'll be forever grateful!

go to the Constitución gallery

Day 13: Tuesday, 1/1: Nevados de Chillán

It was time to move on. Our next stop was Los Ángeles, a town that Google Maps occasionally confused with the more famous American city.

I was feeling so much better at this point that I was willing to try a hike. I checked Google and found a reasonably short hike on the way to Los Ángeles, in the resort area of Nevados de Chillán. The trail was only 6.4 km out and back, with 400m of elevation gain; I felt that I could handle that distance.

As it happens, the distance and elevation gain on that web page were way off — another web page that I looked at later gave the round trip distance as 11.6 km and the elevation gain as 800m, and that seems a lot more accurate to me. By the time we got back to the trailhead, I was hurting pretty badly.

On the positive side, it was a very pretty trail on a very nice day. Until you reach the Refugio Garganta del Diablo, you are walking mostly in native coigue forest, with some huge old trees and many different kinds of birds. (Bob pointed out to me a female carpintero negro, a large red-and-black woodpecker.) The trail climbs brutally steeply to a plateau, then wanders gradually uphill toward treeline, where it pops out at the foot of the Garganta del Diablo (Devil's Throat), with the refugio scenically posed on the skyline to the south.

The refugio could use some TLC. Bob was speculating about how it was built and what could be done to it to make it usable. A volunteer group has been trying to maintain the building, but it's got a long way to go.

go to the Nevados de Chillán gallery

Day 14: Tuesday, 1/2: Stuck

Another sick day for me. I'll spare you the TMI details.

Day 15: Thursday, 1/3: Sierra Velluda

One of my goals in booking Los Ángeles was to get a chance to do the Sierra Velluda hike at Parque Nacional Laguna del Laja (Slab Lake National Park). I was happy to be feeling better and eager to get started.

The park is famous for its two mountains: Volcán Antuco (2979m), a classic active volcanic cone, and Sierra Velluda (3585m), a heavily dissected and glaciated extinct volcano. I was charmed by how they look so distinct, even though they are neighbors. The park is also famous for its lake, Laguna del Laja, formed when a lava flow from Antuco dammed the Río Laja.

Somewhat oddly, the view of Sierra Velluda disappears when you enter the park. I was a little skeptical as we headed up the trail, which switchbacks up a huge lateral moraine. We got to the top of the hill and the spectacular ridge came into full view. We then had to cross a rugged lava field and a mud flat to reach the base of the cliffy north face of the peak, which in summer is decorated with many thread-like waterfalls.

The mountain is just mesmerizing. It doesn't look real at first — all this water and ice coming right after a totally barren and black lava flow. As I stared at it, I could pick out more and more misty waterfalls and spiky crags and narrow crevices. Fortunately there's little to stumble over when crossing the mudflat. We did discover that the outflow from the waterfalls creates fast-moving channels that block access to the cliff face. We weren't prepared to wade through the icy cold water, so we settled for lunch on boulders a hundred feet away.

After the hike, we drove further up the road to see the lake. It's a very large lake, blue and shining in the afternoon sun. I was a bit surprised that the ubiquitous hydropower companies had not built up a huge dam at the outflow, but it became apparent after studying the natural dam that the lake doesn't flow over the top of it. The water comes out through caves or fissures near the bottom of the dam. I discovered later that a hydro company drilled a tunnel through a mountain to take water from a different part of the lake.

go to the Sierra Velluda gallery

Day 16: Friday, 1/4: Laguna Verde

We were moving on to Pucón, but we didn't want to waste a day (by not hiking), so I found a hike for us in Parque Nacional Tolhuaca near Curacautín. We had to drive a fair distance on dirt, but until just before you reach the park boundary, the road is in excellent shape (and it's not too bad after that).

The hike starts with an attractive waterfall, then climbs gradually across a slope through dense forest, eventually reaching the lake, which is in a hanging valley. We met a trail crew installing signs that give the remaining distance to the lake.

The pehuén (monkey-puzzle) trees are one of the big highlights of the hike. They like ridges and summits — when looking across the valley, we could see them outlined on the cliff-edge.

After the hike, we drove to our Airbnb rental in Pucón. We had huge burgers for dinner at Beerhouse on Urrutia.

go to the Laguna Verde gallery

Day 17: Saturday, 1/5: Lago El Toro

We drove over to Lago Tinquilco in Parque Nacional Huerquehue with the idea of hiking to the high lakes (Lago Chico, Lago El Toro, Lago Verde). The winding dirt road up to the trailhead didn't seem to be heavily used, so it was a bit of a shock to reach the CONAF office and realize that there were hundreds of cars parked there. We elected to drive the somewhat-rougher 2 km further to an area of private buildings, where we paid a CLP$2.000 parking fee to an energetic 8-year-old girl.

We passed dozens if not hundreds of people on the way up the trail. The trail has switchbacks, but it's still fairly muddy and quite steep. We stopped at a couple of nice waterfall overlooks, where we saw yet more tourists. I was impressed at how many people actually made it to the upper lakes. Lago Chico and Lago El Toro were very pretty, with granite cliffs that dive into the water, and lush forest.

Lago Verde was not as scenic, and was absolutely jammed with tourists. There were a couple of young women who took out a cheap drone and flew it over the crowd. Bob and I blew on past — there were so many people, it was a bit hard to find a place to stand.

I had a fantastic steak for dinner at La Maga Parrilla Uruguaya on Urrutia. Bob had grilled chicken and a huge salad, but he should have tried the steak!

go to the Lago El Toro gallery

Day 18: Sunday, 1/6: Pucón

Bob hiked Volcán Villarrica on a guided tour with Mawida Adventures. You're required to use a guide service — apparently the local authorities got tired of rescuing independent climbers. Mawida provides all of the necessary equipment, although Bob had brought plenty of his own gear. A paved road takes you to the ski resort at 1400m elevation; if the lifts are running, you can cut 600m off of the 1487m ascent, but in Bob's case, the lifts were shut down and his group had to hike the entire elevation on crappy volcanic rock and on snow. The descent is a long butt glissade.

I wasn't in shape for that kind of hike, and I'm not very fond of snow. Instead I walked around Pucón and took pictures of the Lago Villarrica waterfront area. I also worked on booking accommodation for the rest of the trip.

We had dinner at Fiorentini, an Italian restaurant on O'Higgins. The red and black fresh pasta with seafood was really good.

go to the Pucón gallery

Day 19: Monday, 1/7: a rain day in Pucón

Not too much to say; we did laundry. I'm writing up an entry mainly to mention the two places that we went to eat.

We enjoyed a lazy afternoon at the Cafe de la P on the corner of O'Higgins and Lincoyán. They have a counter in the back with loads of truffles and delicious alfajores (sugar cookies topped with a cone of dulce de leche and dipped in chocolate). Their hot chocolate was great too. We went to Raices on Fresia for dinner. It was nice, but not that memorable (meaning that I don't remember what I ate!).

Day 20: Tuesday, 1/8: a second rain day in Pucón

We picked up laundry. I finished reading a novel.

It was cold and wet and windy when we went to dinner at the Italian restaurant Andiamo on O'Higgins. I believe I had the gnocchi and liked it a lot. I love gnocchi!

Day 21: Wednesday, 1/9: Panguipulli

It was finally time to leave Pucón. The weather was still cool and wet. I wanted to drive out to Liquiñe to check out the scenery, so I concocted an elaborate route where we drove west to Villarrica and then cut southeast to Licanray and Coñaripe on Lago Calafquen before heading east on the Liquiñe road.

Bad news, though. The road was nominally paved, but all of the pavement was ripped up between the main bridge on the Coñaripe side and the Neltume turn-off. There were at least 3 long sections with waits for one-way traffic to clear. The mud and potholes were impressive. I couldn't believe that there were still buses plying the route between Coñaripe and Liquiñe.

Although the pavement started again at the Neltume intersection, we'd had enough, so we headed south past Lago Neltume. Most of this road is dirt / mud, although there are short paved sections at the north and south ends. The views were very pretty over the lake.

Our Airbnb rental in Panguipulli was somewhat rustic. It had a nice location just up the hill from downtown. It was very quirky, starting with the parking — we crammed our HiLux through the iron gate with centimeters to spare on either side, and we parked just a meter from the front doors of the units.

The hot water system was (um) interesting. It appeared to be on-demand hot water, but the flow with the shower faucet completely open was just barely enough to make the heater trigger. If I turned the water temperature down from scalding, then the heat turned off completely and I got icy water instead.

I later figured out that I could run the sink tap and the shower at the same time, and with the two of them together, I could keep the heater on without being forced to use a scalding temperature in the shower. The water flow in the shower wasn't great, but at least I wasn't burning myself!

One nice feature of the unit was that we were easy walking distance from the Mirador restaurant, one of the best in Panguipulli. The food and the hospitality were great, and the views over Lago Panguipulli were spectacular (true to their name).

It was here that I first noticed the bandurrias (black-faced ibises). They are handsome and large birds, and they fly by in staggered arrangements like fighter jets at an air show. They must have somehow reminded someone of the musical instrument called a bandurria, a mandolin-like instrument from Spain.

go to the Panguipulli gallery

Day 22: Thursday, 1/10: Volcán Mocho

We drove out to Volcán Mocho, at the head of Lago Panguipulli. The lake views were amazing. It turns out that CONAF is busy rehabbing the entire area to turn it into a hiking destination. They have a long way to go, but we were shocked to get to the top of a long series of muddy switchbacks in temperate rainforest and discover a visitor center under construction with lots of new trails (also under construction).

We hiked the rough road from the Río Blanco bridge to the old ski resort. We could see fresh snow on the surrounding hills. To get to the summit of the volcano, you have to cross glaciers; I wasn't prepared to do that, but it looked like a fine hike.

We ran into (3 generations of) a German family who live in Liquiñe. Liquiñe is famous for its hot springs resorts — I didn't catch what the family does, but I assume that they own or run a resort. One of them mentioned that last winter, a landslide cut the road (and the power) for a week. These folks had been to the top of the volcano before, and gave us a description of the route.

After the hike, we drove out to Puerto Fuy on Lago Pirihueico. It was jammed with people; I was quite surprised. There was no place to park, so we turned around and drove back to Panguipulli.

go to the Volcán Mocho gallery

Day 23: Friday, 1/11: Cerro Mayo

We moved on from Panguipulli, heading to Lodge El Taique outside Puyehue National Park. Once again we took the scenic route, and once again we took the opportunity to go hiking. We drove down the east side of Lago Ranco, a vast lake surrounded by gorgeous green countryside. On the southeast end, we turned off on a steep and winding dirt road along Estero Pitreño into Parque Futangue. We paid an entrance fee to this private park at a cabin, then continued up to the trailhead parking area.

The park has put in a lot of effort to make the Cerro Mayo trail work even though it's on a steep hill in thick, wet forest. The lower part of the trail is wide with a fairly gentle grade, passing by native trees that occasionally have signs identifying the species. Eventually the trail narrows and starts climbing quite steeply up steps that are reinforced with wooden slats and planks. The trail wends its way north and east out of the Pitreño valley and comes out above the cliffs on the north face of Cerro Mayo. There is a dead forest near the summit — we debated about whether it was weather or volcanic ash that stripped the trees.

The view on top is stunning. Not only is the lake big and blue and attractive, but you can see all the way to Volcán Mocho in the north and to Volcán Puyehue to the south, with a spectacular snow-capped ridge of granite peaks to the east along the international border.

go to the Cerro Mayo gallery

Day 24: Saturday, 1/12: Termas Aguas Calientes

Lodge El Taique is a bit more upscale than the places we'd been staying, but I got a discount on booking.com that let us enjoy it without feeling too guilty. The lodge is in the countryside south of Lago Puyehue, with a wonderful view out over Lago Rupanco toward Volcán Puntiagudo and Volcán Osorno. It is run by a friendly French couple, who make some really great food. The interior design is lovely too, with stone and wood and glass that fit in nicely with the surrounding forest and fields.

This was a rain day. We went to Termas Aguas Calientes, a hot springs resort that is a (much) cheaper alternative to Termas de Puyehue just down the road. We soaked in the public pool, which was fairly crowded.

go to the Lodge El Taique gallery

Day 25: Sunday, 1/13: Volcán Casablanca

We had sunny weather, but inconveniently we needed to leave for Puerto Varas. I decided that we should leave our bags at the lodge, and head east into Parque Nacional Puyehue to hike to Cerro Mirador on the Chile / Argentina border.

This idea came up short when we learned at Chilean customs that the trail was closed. I'm not sure why it was closed — my Spanish wasn't good enough to figure it out.

I worked out a back-up plan: we drove down to Termas Aguas Calientes and then up the hill to the Antillanca ski resort on Volcán Casablanca. Unlike the forest of the surrounding area, the peaks around Volcán Casablanca are bare due to geologically recent eruptions, so it was relatively easy to go cross country from the ski resort to a 1687m sub-peak on the ridge. I say “relatively” because it was a steep slog up loose cinders, with snow cornices at the top. The actual summit of Volcán Casablanca was too far away (and too snowy) for us to tackle given that we needed to take off for Puerto Varas.

We picked up our bags and hustled. We actually made reasonable time even though we followed back roads from Entre Lagos south to Puerto Octay and Frutillar, on Lago Llanquihue. The lake is huge and beautiful; the road runs along the top of the massive terminal moraine on the west side. It eventually meets the Ruta 5 freeway, which we followed to Puerto Varas.

Google Maps had a terrible time finding our Airbnb rental home on the west side of town. I eventually made a lucky guess about the location, behind an iron gate at the end of a ridiculously narrow lane full of awkwardly parked cars and stray dogs.

We had dinner at Donde El Gordito, a hole-in-the-wall seafood restaurant on the corner of Del Salvador and San Bernardo. I thought that they were really good. I especially liked their seafood chupe, which is not what you might think from Google Translate — the name is probably adapted from soufflé, and it's a lot like crab mornay.

go to the Volcán Casablanca gallery

Day 26: Monday, 1/14: Saltos del Petrohue and Lago Todos los Santos

The Petrohue waterfalls are one of the highlights of Parque Nacional Vicente Pérez Rosales so of course the trail was packed with tourists. The waterfalls are still spectacular. Note that I did not shove any tourists over a railing in order to get a better photo.

Lago Todos los Santos appears to have formed when Volcán Osorno dammed the Río Petrohue. It's a deep blue lake surrounded by steep mountains. We took the Paso Desolación trail from the beach area near the outlet, working our way very gradually up to Mirador La Picada. The trail goes a long distance across lahar flows from Volcán Osorno; the forest was clearly destroyed repeatedly, leaving wide semi-bare areas with little islands of green. The bare areas were a perfect environment for the tábanos, the local flavor of horsefly. They circled Bob like biplanes attacking King Kong. Bob broke off a tree branch to use as a whisk, but it didn't seem to discourage them.

We had a very pleasant Italian dinner at Da Alessandro on the waterfront.

go to the Saltos del Petrohue and Lago Todos los Santos gallery

Day 27: Tuesday, 1/15: Puerto Varas

The forecast made the weather sound cold and wet. We stayed in town and I did laundry. Bob and I walked down to the waterfront and took pictures.

Of course the rain held off until evening. It poured while we dined at Las Buenas Brasas on San Pedro. I had a fantastic steak with (yes) crab sauce.

go to the Puerto Varas gallery

Day 28: Wednesday, 1/16: Río Chaica

We went to Parque Nacional Alerce Andino along the coast southeast of Puerto Montt. This was the soggiest rainforest that we'd yet seen, dripping wet after the previous night's storm. The lower section of the trail is very well maintained, with boardwalks and gravel fill to get around wet spots as it follows the river's north bank. At the big waterfall on the Río Chaica, there are even stairs and bridges, with a viewing platform at the El Milenario tree. The tree is an ancient alerce, a kind of cypress.

We kept plugging along, as the trail became less wonderful. Shortly we came to a “trail closed” sign. A bridge that crossed a tributary of the Río Chaica had washed out long ago, and the only way to cross was by hopping across slimy conical boulders and slimy decaying logs. We had lunch while deciding what to do; other hikers showed up and were also intimidated. While we were waiting, a couple of folks came from the other direction and crossed without incident. With that inspiration, a couple of women hikers crossed successfully, so we shrugged and crossed too.

The trail somehow managed to get even wetter and slipperier. We had to cross some big piles of wet logs. We could see traces of maintenance, where planks had been laid down to keep the trail above the mud. By the time we reached Lago Chaiquenes, the trail was mostly mud, roots and rocks. I had hoped to get as far as Lago Triángulo, but it was clear that the trail was a disaster — in fact there was yet another “trail closed” sign for people like us who didn't get the message after the first sign. We started up the trail, but it was hopeless — deep pools of mud, washed-out tree roots and deadfall made progress so slow that we'd never make it back to the trailhead by closing time if we continued.

The sun came out just as we got close to the trailhead, and we could finally see some of the peaks that surround the valley. While we stripped off our muddy boots in the parking lot, we saw a chilla (furry fox-like canid) come down from the CONAF office with an apple core in its mouth.

We had burgers at Vagli's on La Paz. They served a “Chiloé sour”, which turned out to be like a pisco sour but made with Chilote licor de oro, a liqueur made from fermented whey.

go to the Río Chaica gallery

Day 29: Thursday, 1/17: Chiloé

We spent a day touring the northern tip of the big island of Chiloé. Chiloé is just 2.5 km from the mainland at its closest point, and there is talk of building a bridge. We took a car ferry, which was a lot of fun. You can see Volcán Yates and a long wall of snow-topped peaks in the distance to the east, and gentle green hills in the foreground on both sides of the strait.

We walked around the old town of Ancud, stopping at the even older Spanish Fort San Antonio and visiting the Museo Regional de Ancud. There are some really nice cultural displays at the museum, and it was fun to see their blue whale skeleton. Darwin stayed in Ancud while exploring Chiloé on the voyage of the Beagle; he observed a night eruption of Volcán Osorno.

There is a penguin sanctuary at Puñihuil on the west coast. The drive there was entertaining, with paved roads that were very narrow and twisty. When we saw the lines of tourists getting packed into the rafts for the penguin tours, we decided that we'd be good with just walking along the beach and checking out the tidepools.

Back in Puerto Varas, we had dinner at La Marca, a higher end steakhouse. I had another fantastic Chilean steak.

go to the Chiloé gallery

Day 30: Friday, 1/18: Paso Desolación

We had originally budgeted extra time in Puerto Varas to allow us to visit the Cochamó Valley, famous as Chile's answer to Yosemite. But it turns out that you need to backpack into the area if you want to see any of the best features, and we were't prepared to do that.

So on our last day of hiking, we went back to Volcán Osorno. This time we drove around to the north side and went up a dirt road to an abandoned ski area. This was incredibly scenic — pretty green farms with views out to vast Lago Llanquihue, all beneath the looming volcano. The end of the road is the Cafe de Thomas, a rustic shack in the middle of nowhere that offers cold drinks (including beer). The proprietor showed us the difference between the tábanos and the slightly smaller blue biting fly. The tábanos are fairly slow and stupid, and rarely bite humans, but the other flies will zip right in and stab you without warning. This guy could pluck flies out of the air by their wings; I was very impressed.

Bob was not amused by his loyal retinue of tábanos as we climbed the hill to Paso Desolación. He made another fly whisk out of a branch; I had to keep my distance so as not to get smacked in the nose. The view at the saddle was great, but I realized that we could get an even better view by climbing the 200m or so to the top of the ridge just to the north. The view up there was gobsmacking amazing. We could see the bent nail of Volcán Puntiagudo poking up behind the jagged slabs of La Picada. Across Lago Todos los Santos, we could see the glaciers of Cerro Tronador, the extinct volcano that rises higher than everything else in the neighborhood at 3554m. And of course we could see all sorts of details on Volcán Osorno, including a bizarre waterfall and a peculiar sign on the slope with nothing obvious to motivate it.

Naturally we had to hike over to the sign to see what it was about. Getting to it was a small adventure; we had to go up and down and through a series of washed-out little gorges. The sign is hanging out over one such gorge, which is going to eat it before long. The sign is a warning from CONAF that you must register before climbing the peak and that you need the appropriate technical gear. When we got back down the cafe, the proprietor told us that there were a couple of climbers who were overdue — hope they made it down safely.

We ate at Mesa La Tropera, a large pizzeria on the water that was just crammed. We had to wait 20 minutes for a table, which was an unusual experience for us in Chile, since we tend to eat earlier than most Chilenos.

go to the Paso Desolación gallery

Day 31: Saturday, 1/19: Back to SLC

All good things must come to an end...

We dropped off the (filthy) HiLux at the Puerto Montt airport without a problem. We then flew to Santiago on Sky Airlines. I got a great view of the Andes from my east-side window seat. Bob spent the night in Santiago and flew home the next day, while I squeezed into a seat and flew home that night.

Of course, I picked up a cold that kept me miserable for the next 10 days. One of the joys of air travel!

Last Saturday, 10 of us thrashed our way up the west side of Kessler Peak in the Oquirrhs. Kessler and its neighbor to the south, Farnsworth Peak, are the summits in the northern Oquirrhs which have transmitters (visible during the day) and lights (visible at night). Kessler is about 8810 ft elevation, so we had 4450 ft of elevation gain in 3 mi from the trailhead — much like doing Mt Olympus, except all off trail. We followed faint game trails when we could, trying to stay out of the thick oak brush. The footing was generally rocky and loose, and everyone took turns falling; no one was hurt (except for their dignity), but it made progress pretty slow. On the way down, everyone ran out of water, on a day that was 10° warmer than normal with relative humidity lower than 15%. I was staggering like a zombie long before I made it back to the cars.

On the plus side, a breeze from the north blew the wildfire smoke away from us. We got to see the remains of the tram that used to service the installation on top of Farnsworth Peak. I was surprised and impressed at how nice the fall colors were. And the view of the Great Salt Lake from the top is amazing — it looks positively oceanic, in spite of the current low water.

Much appreciation to the survivors: Stanley (co-organizer), Steve, Jim, Sue, Michele, Akiko, Nancy, Scott and Josh.

go to the Kessler Peak (Oquirrhs) gallery

So at the end of my July 4th trip this year, I drove out to the Bull Canyon Overlook at the top of Castle Valley, and then on a lark I followed signs for Fisher Valley, thinking that it might be a shortcut to the Fisher Towers.

As it turns out, the Fisher Towers are in Onion Valley, not Fisher Valley, and my little drive turned into a much more substantial adventure. I followed a bladed and graded road from the Fisher Valley rim near Beaver Creek all the way down to the bottom of Onion Creek, where it comes out at SR 128. The scenery was amazing, but I didn't stop to take photos because I didn't want to delay getting back home. I promised myself that I'd get back here and take my time.

That's how Jerry H and I ended up spending two days to drive 25 mi through this amazing country. After stopping to see the dinosaur footprints at the Bull Canyon Overlook, we drove to the Fisher Valley turn-off and headed down the hill. The road drives right down the narrow ridge between Fisher Valley and Beaver Creek, at one point crossing a one-lane bridge over a notch in the ridgeline. We discovered that upper Beaver Creek has been diverted so that its flow now goes through the notch and down into Fisher Valley — very surprising.

The road then crosses forested North Beaver Mesa to a band of Navajo Sandstone cliffs. An intersection here has a sign for Fisher Valley to the north / left, along with a much-decorated sign for the Kokopelli Trail. We turned and followed this road below the Navajo cliffs. After a while, the road descends at a switchback to the top of the big Wingate cliffs above Hideout Canyon. The road at one point runs just a few yards from the edge, where there's a drop of several hundred feet. You can see the Fisher Towers in the (very) far distance.

The road then crosses the ridge to the east and contours above Thompson Canyon. We took a little hike down a tributary of Thompson Canyon, so that I could see what the gorge looked like — it's deeper than I expected, with Wingate walls and fir trees in crannies on the west-facing slopes. That whetted my appetite for more, so after we came down a steep hill, I decided to take a minor dirt road that runs out in the direction of the confluence of Fisher Creek and Thompson Creek.

This minor road has some fairly serious rocks and ledges, and after banging my skid plate a couple of times, I parked and Jerry and I walked the rest of the way. The view at the end of the road is very cool — both Fisher Creek and Thompson Creek run in deep Wingate-walled gorges with many pinnacles and buttresses. Thompson Creek doesn't appear to slot up, but it's very deep and has gnarly crags, including one bizarre knob that juts up in the middle of the canyon.

We camped at a BLM campground in Hideout Canyon. We actually didn't camp at one of the sites; instead, we found a very pretty and green spot along Hideout Creek below some cottonwoods. The dirt road into the campground is badly washed out, and I'm skeptical that it gets much visitation at this point. It doesn't help that the signage is minimal: just a carsonite strip with a graphic of a tent and an arrow pointing up the road.

The next day, we drove out of Hideout Canyon over a little summit and down into broad Fisher Valley. There are a few clumps of poplars and cottonwoods in the valley that make it look like there might be farmhouses, but we didn't see any actual houses and I've got to wonder how anyone could live in such a remote location.

The drainage divide with Onion Creek is a bit of a surprise. The level basin of Fisher Valley just ends, dropping off into a tangled gorge of red and white rock. The road runs down the spine of a ridge, then switchbacks into the canyon bottom where Onion Creek is still flowing in mid-September. The road fords the creek dozens of times. We stopped in the white narrows (Paradox Formation) to investigate a side canyon with tall, contorted walls. We followed a narrow tributary that twists back on itself and eventually comes out into an upper basin with views of Moenkopi buttresses and the Wingate wall of Sevenmile Mesa.

The upper white narrows fades out and the road then enters an incredible red narrows (Cutler Formation). We stopped at the top of the narrows and hiked a canyon on the north side that I decided to call Titan Canyon because it runs up to the southernmost part of the Fisher Towers, the Titan and the Titan Tower. This canyon is just awesome — narrow, red, full of holes and arches, massively decorated with hoodoos and pinnacles. Just when you think the scenery can't get any better, you turn a corner and there are the Towers.

The road has to climb a bit at the top of the narrows because the canyon bottom gets quite narrow — not quite a slot but very impressive. The road follows ledges along the south side of this gorge, then crosses a one-lane bridge to the north side. The road drops back into the canyon bottom where it widens out, and the fords resume. There are monster pinnacles that loom over the canyon on the south side, with names like the Totem Pole.

As we drove down the canyon, the walls gradually lowered, but they remained tall enough to block the view over to the Towers. We knew that we were back to civilization when we hit the Onion Creek BLM campground. We were running a bit late at this point, but we were happy to have had so much fun.

When we got to Green River, we learned that US 6 was closed over Soldier Summit due to the Pole Canyon fire. Yikes. We drove home on US 70 to US 50 to I-15, and we could see the smoke coming up over Mt Nebo. It looked like there was a smoke-generated thunderstorm cloud east of Nebo...

go to the Fisher Creek / Onion Creek gallery

I scheduled a WMC trip to the Pioneer Range in Idaho for Labor Day. The Pioneers are the range to the east of Sun Valley; they hold the 9th highest peak in Idaho (the lowest 12,000-footer), but the highest parts of the range are hard to see from paved roads. At best you can get a brief glimpse of the peaks while driving between Hailey and Ketchum, but you have to look in the right direction at exactly the right time.

That's too bad, because the Pioneers are just as spectacular as the better-known Sawtooths. While parts of the nearby White Cloud Mountains and Boulder Mountains were recently placed under wilderness designation, the Pioneers somehow didn't make the cut.

A great example of wilderness in the Pioneers is Surprise Valley. On Saturday, September 1st, we did a 12-mile round trip hike from the Fall Creek trailhead to the upper lake in Surprise Valley, nestled beneath 11,878-ft Standhope Peak. The ascent started out fairly gently, with an easy hill that led to the huge upper basin of Fall Creek. Surprise Valley is a hanging valley on the east side of Fall Creek, and the trail makes a rather sudden climb up the wall of the Fall Creek valley to reach it. The surprising part is that Surprise Valley doesn't actually drain out its lower end — as we discovered, the outlet stream leaves a lake and pours out of a cut in the east wall of the valley, dropping into Fall Creek in a dramatic waterfall.

We had lunch along the outlet stream, and then we all agreed to strike out for the unnamed upper lake. This hike along a sketchy route took longer than we expected, partly because we missed the trail and went cross-country through some steep and ledgy terrain, but the lake is gorgeous. In fact the whole upper basin of Surprise Valley is amazing, with serrated granite crags, green meadows and snow patches.

We got back to our site at Wildhorse Campground at around 6 PM, and it was my turn to cook dinner, which meant that I had to scramble. We did eventually get everybody fed, and the wood that Barb scored off of another camper kept us warm, burning in our fire ring.

go to the Surprise Valley gallery

Sunday morning was frosty. We had breakfast bundled up against the cold, then squeezed into my 4Runner so that we could bounce down the 4WD road to the Wildhorse Creek trailhead.

My guidebook said that the hike to Wildhorse Lake starts with a 25-foot wade across the Left Fork of Wildhorse Creek, but we were all very, very pleased to see that the Forest Service has installed a log bridge. The bridge gave us our first view of the photogenic gorges cut by both branches of Wildhorse Creek.

The trail climbs fairly gradually up the east bank of the Right Fork. The views are awesome — the rim of the basin is studded with massive peaks, including the pyramid of 12,009-ft Hyndman Peak and the Matterhorn-like crag of 11,775-ft Old Hyndman Peak. We crossed numerous avalanche chutes, and the trail wiggled its way through piles of debris.

Eventually we came out in a meadow above the gorge. The guidebook recommended a route that crosses the creek, then follows the forest edge for a half mile to a big meadow. Easier said than done — Barb, the first to cross the creek, stepped on a huge boulder that rolled, dumping her in the water. We struggled up boulder-strewn slopes, cutting through deadfall and working around cliffy obstacles, until finally descending into the broad green meadow. Even in September there were flowers in the meadow, and there was a delightful cascade over bare rock at its head.

That's when the real work started. We had to cross another avalanche chute, full of boulders and deadfall. On the other side, we crawled up slabs to reach the base of a couloir. At this point Kathy had had enough, so she parked it on a big rock while the rest of us followed a crack through the cliffs high above us. The crack led to a rocky plateau at 9600 ft, with no lake.

The GPS and the guidebook insisted that a lake was just 500 yards away and 400 ft higher, but it sure wasn't obvious from where we were standing. We convinced ourselves to work our way up the slabs to the right of the stream. There we met a backpacking couple coming down, and they assured us that we could follow a ledge system to the left and we'd be right at the lake. And of course they were right — whew.

The lake was spectacular. It was deep and green, with a snowbank at the south end. It was surrounded by a ragged ridge of rock, boasting huge slabs and pinnacles. The pointy top of Hyndman Peak poked up over the ridge to the south. The rock itself was lovely, a stripy gneiss with chunks of crystals.

It felt like a long hike back down to the car, although it was just 5.7 mi round trip on the GPS. On the way down to the creek, we stayed just inside the forest instead of just above it, and that made the walking much easier, in spite of the occasional deadfall.

Back at camp, Stephen made shrimp scampi, and Barb cooked a whole chicken and a pile of veggies in her dutch oven. A lot of wine was shared and the party went on until dark. The next morning, no one was in shape to do another hike, so we all beat it — Kathy and Stephen heading to Yellowstone, and the rest of us trying to beat the holiday traffic back to SLC.

Many thanks to Barb and her border collie Shasta, Stephen, Kathy and Stanley for a fantastic weekend!

go to the Wildhorse Lake gallery

The goal for our July 4th trip was to hike to the tops of the highest peaks in the northern, central and southern groups of the La Sal Mountains. We met on the evening of the 4th at a fantastic backcountry campsite that Gretchen had located along the Gold Basin Road, off of the Geyser Pass Road in the central La Sals. The campsite has a picnic table, shade and plenty of flat tent sites, and we were very lucky to get it.

The next morning, we headed to Miners Basin to hike to Mt Waas, the high point of the northern group of peaks. It was immediately obvious when we saw the entrance to the Miners Basin Road that it wasn't suitable for Subarus, so we squeezed 11 people and a dog into my 4Runner and Stanley's big diesel pickup and started bouncing in 4WD up the hill. The road isn't rutted or washed out, but it is violently rocky — don't eat a big breakfast before driving it.

The road ends at a small reservoir in the woods, where we were surprised to see a fine Forest Service trailhead sign and (yikes) a toilet. We got our gear out of the bed of Stanley's truck and headed up the trail through a meadow full of of fleabanes and lilies. We also noticed bear poop — actually, quite a lot of bear poop. A note in the register said that one group in the preceding week had chickened out of the Mt Waas hike because of “big bears”.

The start of the Mt Waas trail coincides with the Trans La Sal Trail. At the point where the latter trail starts a switchback up the south wall of the valley, the Mt Waas use trail ducks through some trees and goes up the south side of a meadow. At the upper end of the meadow, the trail seems to fade out, but it actually picks up on the north side. The trail follows an old mining road that stays above the valley floor, with pretty views out to the valley. Eventually it reaches a bare area that has been cleared by avalanches, and starts making switchbacks up the north slope. We were able to follow the trail up several levels of switchbacked mining roads, but as the group spread out, we lost contact with each other and began taking different routes. The lead group left a switchback and climbed straight up the steep hillside to the south, while the middle group went straight at a turn and were forced to go up the hillside to the north. The tail of the group (I and a few other equally slow people) continued following bulldozer cuts all the way to the ridge, and we all met at around the same time.

From the point where the road reaches the ridgeline, we hiked north to Peak 12163. There is a little weather station (?) on the east side; from there, we descended east to a saddle and then faced a slog up the talus to the summit of Mt Waas (12331 ft). Some kind people have constructed steep switchbacks in the rubble, and that trail / route was much better than going straight up the boulders.

We were on top for just a few minutes when we heard thunder, and it began to hail as we scurried back down to the saddle and puffed up the far side. It was great to make it to the top, but we didn't get a lot of time to enjoy our victory.

go to the Mt Waas gallery

Mt Peale in the central group is the highest peak in the La Sals at 12721 ft. As a consequence, it gets a lot of attention, but I found an enticing description of a lesser-known route that goes up via the eastern cirque, called Dark Canyon.

The cirque is absolutely stunning — it may well have the best scenery in the La Sals. However, the access road, Forest Road 4723, has an ugly spot. I took a bad line through the washout and scraped my skid plate; once on the other side, I was able to warn Stanley and he got through it unscathed.

The route starts by following the Mt Mellenthin (12645 ft) trail, but shortly splits off to the northwest on a faint track that soon gets lost in the forest. It crosses a meadow to the foot of a rock glacier, then climbs a grassy verge on the wooded slope to the left of the talus. At the top of the slope lies an unavoidable pile of rubble; we clambered over it into a pretty basin surrounded by the 12000-ft headwall of Mt Peale. The next step was to scale a very steep slope over stunted plants and exposed boulders, working our way to the low point on the ridge to the east of the cirque. This hill was not popular with our group, to put it mildly.

But once on the ridge, it was a pretty straightforward and gradual hike to the summit. The route eventually joins with the trail coming up from La Sal Pass to the south, and we met other groups of hikers there. Both the ridge and the summit have fantastic views in every direction — in spite of some smoke from forest fires, we still had great views of the red rock canyon country to our east and the broken valleys and ridges of the Paradox Basin and Uncompahgre Plateau to the east, not to mention other grand La Sal peaks all around us.

Some folks were eager to try to summit Mt Mellenthin as well, and they took off to run the ridge north. The rest of us headed back somewhat more casually. The weather took a turn for the worse, and it was looking pretty grim by the time that I got back to the saddle. I sent everyone back down the hated steep slope as the gray clouds concentrated and then began spitting hail. When we reached the talus at the bottom, the rain started in earnest, and we tread carefully over the slippery blocks back to the safety of the trees.

At this point, the rain slowed, and that let us see the other folks coming down the north slope of Mt Mellenthin. It turns out that none of them made it to the top before the weather set in (although Beth came very close), but they came down with the big advantage of a nice switchbacked trail.

Our slow group actually beat the fast group back to the trailhead, mainly because we had to travel a much shorter distance. A head count at the trailhead uncovered a problem, however — we were short two people. We waited an hour, and they didn't show up. We called and hiked up nearby prominences to get a view, but we got no results.

After an hour and a half, when I was wondering whether to call Search and Rescue, one of the missing pair arrived on the access road. They said that they and the other hiker had hiked past the trailhead along the stream, and had come out on Forest Road 129 a half mile below the access road. Unfortunately the two of them became separated at that point.

I guess the good news is that we were down to just one missing hiker at this point, and we had some idea of where that hiker probably was. We drove back down the access road, over the washout (no scrapes this time) and back to Forest Road 129. I asked Stanley and his passengers to wait there while I went down the road to look for the remaining hiker.

I drove slowly down the hill, but after 3 miles, there was no sign of the hiker, so I turned around and zoomed back up the road. My guess was that the other hiker had walked past the access road and was now somewhere above the turn-off. I was wrong, but in a good way -- we found the hiker by the side of the road, just a few hundred yards below the turn-off. All's well that ends well (and without the need for SAR)!

go to the Mt Peale gallery

The last peak on the list was South Mountain, 11817 ft. The access is from La Sal Pass; we got there via FR 129, FR 208 and FR 73 on the east side of the range, dirt roads that are in very good condition. The area around La Sal Pass is green and pretty, with extensive aspen forest below some impressive peaks.

When I was planning the hike, I found that the standard South Mountain trail loses and gains 500 ft on its way to a saddle southeast of the peak. A comment on Summitpost mentioned an alternative, bushwhacking at 10000 ft elevation from Medicine Lakes and picking up the South Mountain trail without gaining or losing too much elevation. I decided to try that approach; you can imagine how pleased I was, then, to arrive at Medicine Lakes and discover that an official “Medicine Lakes” trail now connects to the South Mountain trail along exactly the route that I had thought I was going to bushwhack.

The forest along the trail is really special — there is hardly any beetle kill, and there are lots of tall trees. We found abundant feathers, mostly from ravens but also from another big bird that I can't identify. The Medicine Lakes trail is generally level, but the South Mountain trail has some steep sections, particularly toward the saddle. It didn't really dawn on me that the off-trail section from the saddle to the summit gained 1000 ft in 0.6 mi until I was gasping for breath on the steep grassy slope. The angle is unremitting until just before the top.

The view from the summit is incredible. It's actually a better view than the view from Mt Peale, because Mt Peale is set back to the east from its main ridge. I was impressed again at how healthy the forest looks.

On the drive back to camp, Stanley's truck lost its exhaust system. The washboard on FR 129 was probably the last straw. Stanley thinks it'll be cheap to fix — I certainly hope so. Michelle got some great photos of the operation to extract the dangling tailpipe.

Many thanks to the gang who came: David R, Barb G, Michelle C, Stanley, Stephen H, Gretchen, Scott, Mohamed, Deirdre and Beth B!

go to the South Mountain gallery

For Memorial Day this year, I went back to the Pahvant Range in central Utah. The Pahvants run for about 45 mi north/south between Fillmore and Richfield, reaching elevations of over 10,000 ft. The west side is mostly early-to-mid Paleozoic limestone and related rocks, while the east side has Cretaceous conglomerate and colorful Tertiary lake deposits. The conglomerate makes a big reddish-orange wall that looms over Maple Grove Campground in the Fishlake National Forest. Sue, Michelle, Dave and I managed to snag three adjacent sites at the first-come, first-serve campground by arriving by noon on Friday. Stanley showed up around 1 PM.

After setting up camp, we first went over to vertical gorge of Dry Canyon to see whether we could pick up Forest Service Trail 12, which allegedly runs in switchbacks up the north rim of the canyon to the glacial cirque of Robins Valley. I'm glad we checked — there is no sign of this trail on the ground. That ruled out a loop through Robins Valley for Saturday.

We then drove over to the mouth of Red Canyon, to check out possible routes up to Beehive Peak. The roads (Forest Roads 394 and 911) are rocky and rutted, and test your vehicle's clearance, but we managed to get there. Beehive Peak can't be seen from the bottom of the canyon, so I had the thought of checking on the Willow Creek Road (FR 102) to see whether it had been opened for Memorial Day. To my surprise, it was open, so we drove to the summit and checked out FR 442 as an access to the top of Red Canyon. We hiked a short distance to an overlook and got a splendid view of the peak, and everyone agreed that we should approach Beehive from the northwest ridge.

The rest of our group (Nancy, Michele and Stephen) arrived late that afternoon just as the rest of us returned from our drive.

On Saturday, we did a tough hike starting at the campground and running up Rock Creek (Trail 13) to the ridge, then following FR 096 to Jacks Peak (10,072 ft). The Rock Creek trail is not heavily used and is hard to follow in a few sections where it disappears in deadfall or meadows of flowers. It has a constructed tread, so when you find the trail, it's fairly obvious that you are (back) on it. The lower part of Rock Creek has vertical conglomerate walls and a lovely waterfall; the upper part has pretty flowers and forest. We were grateful for the switchbacks in the upper part, but it was still a slog to reach the summit road. Once on the ridge, it was a scenic 2.5-mile road walk to Jacks Peak. The view on top is superb, with peaks and valleys in every direction. Due to the drought, there was very little snow, but there was enough to block the ATVs from the road section north of Jacks Peak, for which we were grateful.

go to the Jacks Peak gallery

My goal for Saturday was to get onto the white platter of limestone on top of which Beehive Peak rests like a pointy pyramid of pink jello. It's really hard to describe just how odd Beehive looks, and it gets odder as you get closer to it — you'll have to check out the photos to see why. We approached the peak from the northwest ridge, and I was pleased to discover that the top of the ridge is a firebreak, so it has been cleared of deadfall and mountain-mahogany thickets. The firebreak was created to help stop a fire that burned out patchy sections of upper Red Canyon, leaving blackened aspen trunks scattered everywhere. (I wasn't the only person to think of cavaletti when I saw the debris.)

We walked right up to the prow on the northwest end of the summit platform. I couldn't see any way through it, although I suspected that there was a route somewhere toward the south end. I had read on Summitpost that there was a “class 4” route through the cliff band on the east side of the prow, and with somewhat dicey weather, I decided to check it out, hoping that it was easier than it sounded. We struggled up through very loose soil to a first cliff band, then found a way through it. That led me to be optimistic: Nancy went up to look at the final cliff band, and I followed, slipping and sliding on the crappy footing. We did find the class 4 route, and it is a solid class 4, unfortunately — a steep crack with a fair amount of exposure and less than wonderful handholds and footholds.

I declared surrender and we retreated. Hail pelted us as we worked our way back up the northwest ridge. But the sun then came out unexpectedly, and we took the opportunity to have lunch with a really nice view of Beehive and the upper forested basin of North Cedar Ridge Canyon.

When we got back to the cars, the sun was still shining. I proposed that we drive south on the skyline road and enjoy the scenery. That worked out splendidly; we got some amazing views of Beehive against the backdrop of a huge thunderstorm over the Sevier Valley.

go to the Beehive Peak gallery

Nancy, Michele and Stephen left on Sunday night before the rain started in camp. The rest of us drove south on Monday, Memorial Day, to visit Cottonwood Canyon, just west of Richfield. It's a charming spot, with what appears to be a perennial stream. The canyon isn't terribly deep, but it has steep, colorful walls and occasional narrows, with lots of cottonwood trees and surprisingly little undergrowth to thrash through. We walked casually for an hour or so up to a narrow section where our progress was blocked by a pool that someone had enhanced by building a rock dam. We got sprinkled on, but it was still a very pleasant day. We finished up at noon and drove back to SLC before the Memorial Day traffic reached its peak.

go to the Cottonwood Canyon gallery

I heard good things about the hike in lower Spring Creek in Capitol Reef National Park. Turns out they're all true!

It's a non-technical shuttle hike of about 10 mi through spectacular Navajo and Wingate sandstone gorges. I decided to take the upstream route, from the junction with the Fremont River up to the Chimney Rock trailhead, mainly because it would shorten our shuttle a little bit — we were camping in the Dixie-Fishlake National Forest on Boulder Mountain to the west. I was a little bit concerned about the start of the hike, where we would have to cross the Fremont River, but this has been a dry year and the river was barely a foot deep.

The Navajo domes and walls were pretty at the bottom of the canyon, and it just kept getting better as we ascended. The walls went from merely tall to enormous, and the wall decorations were numerous and often bizarre. Our necks got stiff from looking up at the amazing pinnacles and walls. The weather behaved nicely, with a cool (and sometimes blustery) breeze along with patches of cloud that brought shade at just the right moments.

Rather than slog through the mud, we took the bypass route around the short central slot section. The Park Service bills the bypass as exposed, but we found it to be a perfectly serviceable trail, albeit on a steep hillside.

The upper Wingate sandstone section is just as colossal as the lower Navajo section. I thought that the painting and staining on the walls was magnificent. The fork that led to Chimney Rock Trailhead, our exit, was deep and red. We had to climb a a pass on the crumbly Chinle formation to get out of the Spring Creek drainage, and we stumbled over a number of big petrified logs. I mistook one of the first ones for a trail bar because it ran right across the trail.

On the drive back down SR-24 to pick up the shuttle vehicle, we saw hundreds of people queued on the Hickman Bridge trail. It looked like an escalator at a big shopping mall. I was happy to avoid that bustle by doing Spring Creek instead.

On the way back west to camp, we stopped at the Sulphur Creek Goosenecks overlook. I was impressed at the depth of the gorge, and the lengthy drop from the overlook's edge.

Many thanks to Leslie and Stanley for helping to make this such a fine trip!

go to the Spring Creek gallery

Williams Peak is the second highest summit in the Canyon Range, west of Scipio. I'd been on top of it a couple times in the past, ascending it from 8 Mile Canyon to the south and west, but I had always wondered whether there was a route through the spectacular cliffs in John Williams Canyon on the north side. I was also looking for a chance to check out some of the last original forest in the Canyon Range, which was spared by the 107,000-acre Clay Springs fire in 2012 that burned out most of the rest of the Canyon Range.

Three intrepid explorers showed up for this adventure — Sue, Stanley and Jim. It took us 80 minutes to drive south on I-15 to Scipio, where we waited in line at the gas station bathroom as dozens of Army (or National Guard) troops from a bus took advantage of a rest stop. From there, we drove about 5 mi on increasingly rugged dirt roads up into John Williams Canyon.

We parked and walked the road up the canyon. To my surprise, the rutted and rocky lower section of the road gave way to a relatively well-maintained road winding through white-fir and Douglas-fir forest up to a spring. A water pipe followed the road and you could hear the rushing water through vents. After this first spring, the road continued as an ATV track to a higher spring that was also tapped for irrigation water. This track got us fairly high in the canyon, but it left us with about 1000 feet of elevation gain to the ridgeline, with nothing but animal trails to follow through the brush.

After first leading us astray into a side canyon, I decided to believe my GPS and we traversed into the the correct canyon. There were impressive walls on both sides, and the canyon narrowed as we got closer to the ridgeline. The brush was annoying but there was actually fairly little deadfall and the animal trails avoided the worst of the terrain. Eventually we reached the top of the canyon at a break in the cliffs; I was very pleased that the route actually worked!

From this break, I thought that we'd have a fairly straightforward 1-mi hike to the summit of Williams Peak. I was wrong about this, unfortunately — we had to endure quite a bit of ugly mountain-mahogany thrash, and we had to work through a few up-thrust cliff bands. The reward was a fantastic 360-degree summit view, with cliffs and forest in the foreground and mountains and valleys in the background. The Wasatch Plateau was a striking white stripe of snowcapped ridges to the east, while we could make out Notch Peak and Mt Moriah to the west. Mt Nebo looks really grand (and really snowy) from this angle.

The bushwhacking on the return was just about as slow as it was on the way up, and we were all grateful when we heard the splash of water in the upper spring and popped out of the forest onto the ATV track. We got back to the park-and-ride lot at about 7:30 PM. Thanks to Sue, Stanley and Jim for putting up with my ambition to tackle Williams Peak again!

go to the Williams Peak gallery

On my first camping trip with the WMC this spring, we went to Moonshine Wash and Colonnade Arch. Moonshine Wash is a pretty little canyon that empties into the San Rafael River just before the latter empties into the Green River. It's about 20 mi south of the town of Green River.

On Friday afternoon, we did a hike up the central part of Moonshine, a fine canyon in the Navajo Sandstone. This section isn't a slot, but it's a pleasant hike with steep walls and pretty colors. The hard part was finding access from the east side; we had to go fairly far downstream to get into the canyon, but we were able to find an exit that was closer to the nicest part of the canyon. The central canyon has sections that are carved out in a tunnel-like shape reminiscent of the Subway in Zion (but much wider). We found lots of chert, which is a hard silica rock that forms through chemical action in beds of limestone. The colors and shapes were striking — pale translucent, blood red, golden yellow, vivid green (!) and delicate pink, with sculptured or knobby forms.

We hiked the classic slot section of Moonshine on Saturday. We took our time and enjoyed the hike, which has several non-technical scrambles. We took in the view of the so-called 'sheep bridge' from below, which was amazing. After passing through the slot section, we hiked down into the central section and connected with the end of our hike on Friday. The walls in this section are extravagantly painted, with cavities that contain bird nests — we were surprised and amused at one point when a raven flew out of a deep hole above our heads. We scrambled out of the canyon on a steep route to the west, then followed GPS directions to an overlook of the actual cement tanks where people had made moonshine. The tanks were in a side canyon with steep walls, and we didn't see an obvious way down. We then hiked upstream along the rim, cross-country over Carmel Formation badlands and Entrada Sandstone slickrock, until we reached the sheep bridge again. The sheep bridge from above looks well-aged and not very sturdy, and naturally it's placed over a very intimidating drop. I don't think we would have found the bridge without GPS coordinates, and the crossing back to the east side was also helped by GPS coordinates.

Colonnade Arch was the main event on Sunday. We drove 10 or so miles south on good bladed roads to a spur road that heads east toward the Green River. I had been led to believe that this road was in bad shape, but in fact it is bladed almost all of the way to the end, with one slickrock section that isn't too bad. (The last third of a mile or so is quite rough, however.) The arch is also called 5 Hole Arch — whatever the name, it's a spectacular cluster of arches in an awesome location above a big drop to the Green River. We admired the holes / rooms and the ceilings; we peeked skeptically over the insane vertical drops; and we all took zillions of photos, me included. It's really a special place, and we speculated about how cool it would be to shoot the arches at dawn, or dusk, or even at night.

go to the Moonshine Wash gallery

I spent a week in (mostly) southern Nevada for Thanksgiving this year. I had vacation that I needed to burn up, and I was restless to get out of town and to find some warmer weather. I had a great time, hiking with various folks from the WMC, but (except for the first day) not on an official Club trip.

Sunday 11/19: I joined up with the folks at Bruce Christenson's open house in St George on Saturday evening. I mentioned that I wanted to see some petroglyph sites at Gold Butte National Monument before the administration abolishes the monument. That proved to be a popular idea, so I organized a 2-car expedition the next day. We passed the Bundy Ranch on the way into the monument, a reminder of the conflict over the land here.

Gold Butte National Monument is on the east side of the Overton Arm of Lake Mead. It has a mix of basin-and-range and sandstone slickrock scenery, and they're both very impressive. We visited the Falling Man and Kohta Circus rock art sites. They're both spectacular, with some of the best and most prolific petroglyphs I've ever seen.

go to the Gold Butte gallery

Monday 11/20: Bob Myers had hiked to Hepworth Canyon from Gifford Canyon on the east side of Zion National Park a few years ago with some Club members from St George, and he wanted to retrace that hike. Gifford Canyon starts right at the top of the tunnel — the parking situation was pretty obnoxious. We got to the first pour-off and scrambled around it, then we went hunting for the route up to the rim from a big slickrock bowl just downstream from the pour-off. Without any cairns or GPS coordinates, I wasn't able to see the correct route; Bob's vague memory was actually correct (I checked online when I got back home), but I foolishly made us turn around because I was concerned that we'd get cliffed out. I tried an alternate route and it petered out in some fourth-class friction slabs. Oh well!

We kept going up the main canyon, with the idea that we could at least go up the side canyon that Bob had descended on the previous trip. That did work out, although the routefinding was a bit of a challenge at the bottom of the side canyon. We headed west up a gorgeous slickrock bowl and were treated to fantastic views at the ridgeline down into Stevens and Hepworth Canyons, and over to the Towers of the Virgin. We were even able to get a little peek into Parunuweap, far, far below to the south.

go to the Gifford Canyon gallery

Tuesday 11/21: After spending the night at a hotel in Mesquite, Bob and I went north to Davidson Peak, the high point of the East Mormon Mountains. I had my eye on this peak because it looks really cool on Google Maps, with a gnarly gorge that leads up to a summit that overlooks a thousand-foot drop.

This hike turned out to be a lot more work than I'd expected, which is a bad habit of mine. On the other hand, it was really pretty amazing. The gorge didn't look like it would go, but it twisted and turned and eventually opened out on a steep upper bowl. The bushwhacking was fairly obnoxious, and although the temperature was in the 70s, I had to put on my wind pants to keep from getting shredded by the thorns and the twigs. We found a decent-sized arch on the way up to the ridge, and the view on top was awesome. The cliff on the north side of Moapa Peak really stands out from this angle, and for that matter, the cliff on the west side of Davidson Peak is pretty good too. We came down the ridge on the south side of the gorge, which was very steep but had good footing on the extremely sharp limestone.

go to the Davidson Peak gallery

Wednesday 11/22: After Bob drove home early in the morning, I left Mesquite and drove up Kane Springs Wash to Meadow Valley Wash, and I found a campsite at Kershaw-Ryan State Park. I went for a short hike up the canyon and got a fine view from the rim. Bob Grant and Marilyn Smith met me at the campground in the afternoon — we were the only visitors there for Thanksgiving. It was nice and quiet, except for the occasional distant train horn on the Union Pacific line, and there were hot showers for just $0.25 for 4 minutes!

go to the Kershaw-Ryan State Park gallery

Thursday 11/23: Bob and Marilyn and I checked out the sights along Meadow Valley Wash in Rainbow Canyon. Our first stop was the pictograph site at Etna, a settlement along the railroad that is now long gone except for a bizarre tunnel that was drilled through the mountainside to divert the flow of a side canyon away from the railroad bed. The pictographs are in that side canyon, and the stroll through the tunnel is fun (but watch your head).

Next we stopped at a side canyon that had caught my attention on Google Maps' satellite view. A hike up to it confirmed that it's a big, bizarrely sculpted amphitheater made from cream-colored tuff. The towers and walls were very attractive, but the brush in the wash bottom was a serious problem. I bagged it after reaching a pour-off — I think I might have been able to pass the pour-off on ledges, but thrashing through the brush to get there just didn't look like fun.

We visited pretty little Hummingbird Spring next. It's in a very cliffy canyon, and the running water supports lots of grapevines as well as some cottonwood trees in fall colors. There are pictographs on the north wall of the canyon, but the area appears to have been vandalized — too bad.

After a stop at the Elgin Schoolhouse (now a state park), we checked out the glorious fall colors of the cottonwoods along Meadow Valley Wash below the end of the paved road. We caught the colors at exactly the right time — I remember telling Bob that no one would believe that the brilliant yellows in our photos were natural, that we had to have goosed the saturation in Photoshop.

go to the Meadow Valley Wash gallery

Friday 11/24: I had been to Cathedral Gorge State Park once before, 27 years ago in fact. I had a great time there then and I thought that it was worth a repeat visit, plus Bob and Marilyn had never been there.

On my first visit, I had found a long canyon with a ‘natural tunnel’ that ran for many yards, much longer than a natural bridge. I didn't find it on this trip, but I found something even better — a chamber that really deserves the title of ‘cathedral’. I managed to persuade both Bob and Marilyn to check it out too; we were all just blown away. It appears that there are underground drainage channels all over the park, and some of those channels have produced cave-like formations in the mud that are not just big enough to walk through, but up to 60 feet tall. I'm thinking that I'll plan a Club trip back to Cathedral Gorge so that I can show off this crazy landscape.

go to the Cathedral Gorge gallery

Saturday 11/25: We left Saturday to avoid the Thanksgiving Sunday traffic, but on our way out, I took us to an area that I (once again) found using Google Maps' satellite view. It sits just a few miles north of NV 319 on the Panaca Kilns road, in an area of extensive pinyon-juniper forest. I've been calling it the Panaca Kilns Tuff Wonderland, which probably oversells it a little bit, but it's really quite pretty. It's similar to the Elephant's Back near Indian Peak — a large area of exposed and eroded tuff that forms slickrock landscapes studded with pinyon and (in this case) ponderosa pines. Some of the charm has been lost after a large fire burned on the western margin of the tuff, but it's still very handsome. We hiked up to the high point at the southern end of the area, and we could see that the rock formations continue north for another mile or two.

go to the Panaca Kilns Tuff Wonderland gallery