Trip Report: Viva Las Vegas
Walking along the dirt road towards the ridge. Such a beautiful rocky landscape.
It had been far too long since I have spent time in the desert. Sure, it’s only been about 6 months but there’s just something about that red and orange rock that keeps me wanting to come back even right after I’ve left. My buddy, Daniel, sets up canyoneering meet ups a few times a year and had one coming up in Las Vegas. I knew I had to go. Vegas is known for the sky scrapers lining The Strip, but the sky scrapers just outside of town are even more breathtaking.
The nice thing about these meet ups is it is a great way for me to network with other creative adventurers that I can develop working and personal relationships with. Plus, it’s a great excuse to get into some slot canyons and have some fun.
It’s a 9+ hour drive from where I live in Colorado to Las Vegas, more specifically, Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area. My friend, Peter, and I left in the afternoon on Thursday. We decided to break up the drive and spend the night in St. George, Utah.
We rolled into camp at around 12:30 AM after a few fun detours with washed out bridges and closed roads. A bit later than we had hoped but not late enough for us to give up on having a fire! There’s just something about lighting a camp fire that makes you feel like you’ve made it home, wherever you decide to park it for the night.
Very mini slot, but it still had some great texture and depth.
We woke up the next morning curious as to what the landscape looked like. Peter had spent quite a few hours staring at this area on Google Earth and was fairly certain he found a mini slot somewhere amongst all of this crazy rock formations that appeared to be in front of us. We hiked down the road a few minutes when we started to see the rocks stretching above the horizon. As we hiked up the ridge the landscape changed dramatically with Indian Paintbrush flowers starting to bloom all around us. The desert was coming back to life.
Once we got over the ridge, we hiked along a wash for about 10 minutes before we came to the slot. The slot wasn’t long, maybe 100 yards but it had all sorts of beautiful twists and turns that gave it a great feeling of depth. We decided not to linger as we looked back and saw clouds moving in that looked ominous.
Once we got back to the van we started down the road towards Vegas. Our timing couldn’t have been better because right as we got on the firmer dirt road the skies opened up and it just poured. You don’t want to get stuck down sandy roads when it starts raining as they turn real slick real fast.
Seeing some of the incredible rock colors and texture in the Calico Hills was pretty amazing.
After braving the Vegas traffic, we arrived at the Red Rocks campground where we met Steve, one of the other fine people who was attending the meet up. We were the only people who had shown up so far and it was still fairly early so we decided to do a quick canyon that was right inside the gate to Red Rocks.
The canyon was located in the Calico Hills section, the hills are actually old sand dunes that formed around 180 million years ago. As we hiked up the old dunes, we passed some of the crazier rock colors and patterns I’ve seen with swirls of purple and white on massive boulders that we had to climb over.
The head of the canyon is at the top of the dunes, which gives you a great view of the Las Vegas Strip 14 miles away as the crow flies. The canyon wasn’t a canyon as much as a series of cracks through random dunes. We set up our last rappel as the sky was starting to catch fire for sunset. Not only that, but a wedding party was also blasting The Foo Fighters and who doesn’t like rappelling with some bitching tunes.
We got back to camp to find more people had arrived, some old friends and some new. As the campfire got going everyone congregated and tried to figure out who was going to go into which canyons. Almost every canyon in Red Rocks is an all-day event with big approaches. After debating it for a while Peter and I joined a group to do the crown jewel of Red Rocks, a canyon called Ice Cube.
Tossing the rope right at sunset for our last rappel.
The next morning started well before sunrise as we were anticipating the canyon taking around 11-14 hours and none of us really wanted to finish in the dark. We all piled in cars and headed towards the trail head. As soon as you start on the trail you are hiking straight up hill, climbing 1500’ in just a mile. I really regretted that last beer the night before about ¼ mile into it.
Endless reflections in Ice Cube.
Once you get to the top you hike along the ridgeline until you run into the head of the canyon. As we reached the top, we all took a minute to recharge and put on our wetsuits. There is a lot of cold water in this canyon and wet suits are required. As we rolled up on the first rappel, we found a rather large snow bank... We knew it was going to be cold but we didn’t think it was going to be that cold! Luckily, that was the only spot we ran into snow.
As we moved through the canyon and it’s 24 rappels, we were treated to endless clear pools of water with glowing reflections of the rock walls around us almost making me feel like I’m getting two canyons for the price of one with all of the mirrors the pools were forming.
Before we knew it, our group leader for the day (who had done the canyon before) said we only had 3 rappels left, which meant we were almost done because the last 3 are one right after the other. We checked the time and all of us were astonished as we were only 7 and a half hours in and were almost done with the canyon!
The last rappel is a doozy! It’s 200 feet down a small crack in the canyon wall. Not only is it 200’ down but to get clipped into the rope, you have to stem (climb) out above the 200’ to clip in with nothing but air between you and the bottom and once you're clipped in you then get to start your rappel.
We ended up finishing the canyon and were back at the cars in 9 hours. Needless to say, we were all pretty exhausted but also pretty proud of ourselves for moving through as well as we did. When everyone got back to camp (hours after that) it sounded like there wasn’t going to be a whole lot of people doing canyons the next day. Peter and I definitely weren’t going to as we were exhausted and were planning an overnight backpacking trip the following day.
Beating the heat in a slot canyon is definitely the way to go.
After packing up our gear and helping clean up the campsite we started to drive toward the trailhead for our backpacking trip that was just across the border in Arizona. As we drove, we started to come to terms with the fact that it was really hot out and neither one of us really wanted to go hiking in the blazing sun hauling our heavy packs.
Instead, always reliable Peter had spotted another mini slot in the area so we ventured over to it with our sleeping pads and beat the heat in the shade of a mini canyon. We hung out there, got some rest, listened to some podcasts and then went back to the van when the sun's rays were more glancing and the sun was clearly starting to set.
Once we got back to the car and got our gear situated, we started our 3-mile hike right around sunset as the first orange tones were kissing the sky. Where were we hiking to? Well we were hiking to Arizona Hot Springs, which is a hot spring in a slot canyon. What better way to end a trip than to soak in a hot spring?
Our hike in was pretty incredible. We started out above the tops of the canyons and slowly went down into them through a wash with the walls growing ever larger on each side. There would be some narrow sections that opened back up into wide areas with big walls on either side. The hike itself was worth it even if there wasn’t an awesome hot spring in the canyon!
Exiting another narrower section on our hike down to the hot springs.
We got to the mouth of the hot springs section and heard quite a few people in there so we decided to spare them the sight of our reflectively white torsos and went to set up camp and eat some food.
As we were sitting there waiting, we saw a big group of night hikers who were heading for the hot springs. Instead of following them straight in we decided to wait it out. We had all night so we cracked a couple of beers and just sat back, took some photos and relaxed. A little while later those same hikers passed us again in mildly awkward fashion and we jumped at the chance to go to the springs and hopefully have it to ourselves.
As we got down to the hot springs, we found that they were empty! We walked through the first very scolding hot pool and to the sandbag waterfall on the other side to find multiple more pools each one getting a little cooler as you get away from the source. It was incredible! As we got to the lowest pool, we started to hear voices again... and then we saw the headlamps... our time of having the springs to ourselves was over. But hey, that’s alright, good way to meet new people!
As the group starting piling in, I was sweating carrying around my camera and tripod trying to get a few shots. I wasn’t sweating because of how hot the water was, I was sweating because if I tripped with my camera in the pools that would have been a bit of a bummer to say the least.
Getting ready to go get our soak on.
Our new friends were none too pleased about me taking photos so I wrapped taking shots quite a bit quicker than I had wanted. But with their headlamps and lights I wasn’t really getting the photos I wanted anyways. Just means I'll have to backpack in there again sometime, darn.
After about an hour or so we went back to camp and were trying to wait them out. As time passed though we decided that we should just get some sleep and get up early to go back in before hiking out, trying to beat the sun and the heat.
We got up early the next morning as planned and packed up camp as quickly as our tired minds could. We headed down to the hot springs and much to our surprise and luck, the 2 people currently enjoying them were leaving. After soaking for a little while and meeting a gentleman named Mike who hikes into the springs and helps build and take care of them each year (building the pools with sand bags) we decided to head back and start our drive back towards home.
The moon rose and started to light up the hot springs.
After a quick stop along the Colorado to refill our water bottles we started the very gradual and leisurely hike back towards the van that meanders through a different section of canyon than the one we had used to hike in. I'm fairly certain that the clouds that decided to linger over head made the trek back quite a bit more enjoyable then it would have been if they weren’t there. The only way the hike back could have been more pleasant would be if there was someone serving coffee and breakfast in the middle of the canyon.
Once we got back to the van, we exchanged high fives chugged some water and started our journey back home. The journey would end up being the vans last... In the middle of nowhere Utah the van threw a rod which then shattered our oil pan. It needs a new engine and that’s something Lauren and I just don’t think we can feasibly afford right now. Not only that, we just aren’t sure we want to keep putting money into the van when we want something a little different.
I’m not going to lie; it was a very hard pill to swallow. I love our van; I’ve become attached to it in the year we’ve had it and lived in it. Does it have its things that we would like to improve in it? Absolutely. Is it more feasible for us to save our money and reinvest in something more suited to our needs? Again, absolutely. Still, that doesn’t dull the pain of saying goodbye to a van that become our home, a spaceship allowing us to shoot for the stars. Luckily though, I feel this adventure was a fitting end for the van. It broke down on a trip that Lauren wasn’t on, in a way reminding me that it’s our dream to be on the road, together.
Taking one last look at the Colorado River before heading back to the van.