Have you ever had one of those moments you aren’t sure you can go forward and you most certainly can’t go back the way you came?
On the first full day of our honeymoon trip to Arizona and Southern Utah, we got up in the morning and drove to the Paria Contact Station outside Grand Staircase Escalante and talked with a helpful ranger about where would be a good place for an overnighter we didn’t need a permit for. She directed us towards the Lower Hackberry Canyon Trail and we got the appropriate maps. The ranger also shared about a side trail to something called Yellow Rock the started at the same trailhead and gave us some general directions. It didn’t sound that complicated and I added it to my mental trip itinerary. We thanked her for her assistance, filled our water bottles from a rusty spigot in the parking lot and drove to where the trail started on Cottonwood Road off HWY 89 in Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument.
I won’t bore you with the details of stopping along the way to “discover” fossilized shells from when this area was a seabed, our parking the rental car, and finishing the packing of our packs for a night’s stay. Actually, the shells were pretty cool, insert picture…
Loaded up with our packs, we left the car and started up a path leading towards the canyon, crossing a wide and shallow Hackberry Creek first. We had been told that the trail to Yellow Rock was along this spot, just follow the creek in, turn left for a bit and then right up a second canyon on an established trail. No problem.
We followed the creek in and I spotted what looked like a side trail to the left (foot prints) and we found ourselves following a side canyon (more of a washout) up and over some boulders that must come down with the heavy rains. I wasn’t sure it was right because it had been made to sound more defined but I figured I would spot the turn to the right soon and all would be good.
Whatever. The “trail” became less and less defined and it was clear that to continue would be more of a scramble than a hike. Which is never fun in my book when I am carrying an overnight bag versus just a daypack. That whole center of gravity thing. But we are stubborn and it was kind of fun to get back out there after being on the sidelines due to injury.
Unfortunately, the fun came to a halt when I heard my husband, who was about 20 feet up above me checking to see if a ramp we spotted “to the right” would take us up over a cliffband, yelled down for me to get out of the way. “I have a loose rock, about the size of a microwave, ready to come down.” Needless to say, I made my way quickly down and over out of the path I had been on before it came tumbling down a few feet from me. I muttered something about how this was supposed to be my honeymoon, darn it.
Shortly there after, he (we) determined that was not the way to go and we retreated down. Not far, although I was not completely against returning to the car and retracing our steps to find the “real” route. We discussed the fact that this was definitely not the actual way to reach Yellow Rock, but the map showed we just had to get over this short cliff band (just about 50-60 feet left to go to where it leveled out and met the trail on the map). But where?
My husband noticed a route that would take us around and up another ramp, this one with much less scree and a lot more vegetation. Halleluiah for the “veggie belay”. He was again about 20 feet ahead and up in front of me when I came out to see this:
Uh, honey. You remember that I am shorter than you, right?
I looked down and really didn’t want to retrace my steps up what I had already conquered. Mind you, I am just 8 months from my crushed shoulder injury and I will fully admit I am still babying that thing. It is going to have to earn my trust before I use it for my full weight.
But sometimes the only option is up so with a real favoring of my left arm (thankfully most of the vegetation was on the left side of the gully up), I was soon following my new hubby up and over onto more “level” ground.
The views from Yellow Rock were vast and colorful and we joked about how to scramble down into the canyon from here to continue our trip instead of taking the trail down. All I knew for sure is we would not be returning the way we came…
There is more to our adventure up Hackberry Creek but I’ll save that for another day. I will show you, however, what our route looked like when I snapped a picture on the way out the next day.
The question always sits in my mind after exciting thrilling memorable crazy expeditions like this, would I have gone if I had known beforehand?
This post was written in one hour for the #NatureWritingChallenge on Twitter.
You can read more about the trail way to get to Yellow Rock here. If you want to know about our overnight, you will want to read: Hackberry Canyon: Escaping The Fecal Forest. And for our entire itinerary, you will find it at: Our 6 Day Southwest Hiking Road Trip Itinerary.
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