Elephant Hill

wes242

This one time...
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Feb 4, 2012
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The Needles District of Canyonlands are one of my favorite places to go. If your in a car you can only enjoy part of it, but in a 4×4 you can see so much more, along with on foot and all the water you can carry. I have backpacked in here a couple of times, but always on the same trail. So many other things to see but once you find a spot you love it is hard to go anywhere else. This time there were 4 adults and an almost 1 year old out on the trail but in our Tacomas. Elephant Hill is what we were hitting up and over. There were tons of people at the trailhead but hiking out to Chesler Park so they got to watch us climb the hill. It wasn’t to bad of a climb but it did have its moments of thrills coming down the backside. Our destination was Horsehoof campsite, which I reserved 6 months ago. Sure it was less then a ten mile drive but it took over 2 hours to ge there on the trail. We had a few Squeezes to go through and a couple hills on our way out.






Finally we got to our camp and I was about bounced out for the day on the trail, it was good to be out on my feet to go do some exploring. We hiked around the Pinnicles in our site having some fun climbing in some slot cayons looking for more great views. Then it came time to cook dinner and we realized how many basic things we forgot. No plates, spatulas, paper towels, spray for the grill…. and a few other things. Guess we were to excited to get out! We made the best of it flipping burgers with my pocket knife, and using the park map as a plate.
I was hoping to take some awesome sunset pictures, but we had no clouds. It was still a nice view. Then I waited for the moon to go down to try some star pictures, and had to wait till just after 4am for that. I had a little bit of some decent light to see the Milky Way before it dissappeard due to the sun starting to light up the sky. I haven’t had good luck with night lighting in a long time. Some day.





We debated on going out to another spot outside of the park and camp one more night, but with the amount of driving we would have had to do that last day we didn’t. We got up and packed up as there was a storm rolling in. At least it cooled the temp as we were about to hike the Joint Trail into Chesler Park. The sun did pop out and warmed the place up again on our way back to the truck. Once we got back the parking lot in the middle of nowhere was FULL.. Sure is a popular spot with the off road vehicles. We started our treck back out and down Elepant Hill and made it back to Moab for one more night. It was a good trip and I can’t wait to get back out there.

I put together this video of the trail…


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The Needles do have a look about them don't they. Nice catch of the light on the rocks over camp.
 
Awesome. You just inspired me to finally plan a trip out there. Horsehoof looks awesome, think it's the best over there?
 
Awesome. You just inspired me to finally plan a trip out there. Horsehoof looks awesome, think it's the best over there?
There is a bunch of good camp sites but I like the once you pass just after the Squeeze... There are a bunch close to each other and you do have some shade in between the rocks. Horsehoof is awesome but there isn't much shade. It was a bit warm there and we were fighting for the shade. I do love that it is away from anyone else though. I would like to stay 2 nights and hit them both.
 
There is a bunch of good camp sites but I like the once you pass just after the Squeeze... There are a bunch close to each other and you do have some shade in between the rocks. Horsehoof is awesome but there isn't much shade. It was a bit warm there and we were fighting for the shade. I do love that it is away from anyone else though. I would like to stay 2 nights and hit them both.

That's Devil's Kitchen. All four sites are tucked in behind the rocks, with two pit toilets. They're very nice, and fairly quiet as well. We're hoping to maybe get back there this fall again.
 

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