grand staircase

September 2010 September brings colder weather back to the high elevations and me back to the desert. This year we planned a nice backpacking trip to Death Hollow. One of my favorite desert destinations. It was the first place I ever backpacked and it's an awesome place to bring the dogs. We've...

I have been looking at doing this hike for years, but never planned to do it till a few months ago. My wife and I have heard great things about Coyote Gulch so we took some time off to give it a shot. Now there are so many ways that you can do this hike that is the major battle in planning…...

It was our 5 year anniversary and we decided to celebrate it with a backpacking trip in Escalante's Coyote Gulch. We had talked about doing this hike for a long time and we were so happy to finally do it. This was only our 2nd trip to Escalante area (as a couple), but we love going there and...

September 2010 I had the pleasure to get out and do some canyoneering with Kev, Mike and Aram earlier this week. I had previously done quite a bit of rappelling, some climbing and lots of backpacking so it wasn't too far out there to go technical canyoneering. The original plan was to hit a...

January 2011 I spent a few days last week camping in the Escalante area. We didn't get in nearly as much hiking as planned but we still got to see some cool stuff. The temps at night were into the 20's with a slight breeze so it felt even cooler. Daytime temps were into the 50's which felt ohhh...

In today's adventure, we dodge the weather and eventually find ourselves in the Navajo Nation. We spent the night in Torrey, Utah, just outside of Capitol Reef National Park. The following morning, we headed south on scenic Utah Rt. 12 towards Boulder and Escalante. Our first obstacle of...

May 2011 This will go down as one of my longer trip reports. I can't help it though, this trip was really, really nice. Hard to put it to words but this excerpt from Desert Solitaire says it pretty well. Hiking in the desert truly is one of my favorite things in the world. So far this month I...

May 2010 Coyote Gulch, one of the premiere backpacking destinations in the state of Utah. I had always wanted to check it out but no dogs are allowed so for several years I passed it by for the many other dog-friendly canyons in the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. But in May, 2010...

Near the end of last October I set out from home (Placitas, NM) for a trip to Zion to get in some hiking and leaf photography. The ghost town of Old Paria, a place I had never seen, was along the way and about 430 miles away, so I decided to stop there and camp for the first night. On US 89...