Day 4 in the Grand Canyon, March 17, 2021. St Patty’s Day! Today I continue along the Escalante Route downriver towards Escalante Creek, 75-Mile Canyon and Papago Creek.
It was a chilly morning, about 38 degrees. I didn’t sleep well, I’m stuffy and finally feeling the dusty crustiness associated with hiking in the desert. Tonight I need to wash up best I can!
I boiled some water and made oatmeal with raisins, and some coffee. My feet were finally feeling the pressures of hiking, but nothing major. Did some basic foot maintenance on any hotspots to prevent issues later.
It was a beautiful looking day! The river was still low of course, so I filtered and filled all 4 liters. My mileage shouldn’t be massive today, but I knew the terrain would be crazy and there’d be no water available most of the day.
My food bag was final starting to look and feel a little more normal. I’ve eaten a few dinners, some breakfasts and plenty of snacks. The major weight is the insane amount of trail mix and the heavy goodness of Lemon Lime Gatorade.
This was the first trip with the Ursack, other than just carrying everywhere I went in my daypack for several months. I have to say I really like it! It will be my go-to food bag from now on. I appreciate the critter proof toughness, and the yellow color is easy to find among the stuff sacks in my pack. This is not the bear-proof version, so I’d still use my Bear Vault canister for when that’s needed.
Escalante Route
Once you get up and away from Cardenas Beach you have a fork in the trail. One goes up, promising sweeping views of the Canyon, while the other maintains a steady elevation and slightly more distance (very slight).
I went up.
Worth it? Sure, with the cool views and remains of a structure. Better than the other route? Well, it was UP, but having not hiked the other path, I have no comparison to make. It was a bit of a climb, but I wasn’t disappointed by any means.
Unkar Rapids, straight down off this cliff face. There’s a short little side trail over to this area. With the low water the rapids didn’t look like much different than all the others, but standing on the edge, looking straight down was something to behold.
This was well worth the diversion, in my opinion. Of course I prefer the views of the Colorado any chance I get.
Hot and Dry
The Escalante Route continues on, and it was HOT. I cannot imagine doing this during the hotter months.
The trail is easy to follow, I had zero issues navigating the route along this stretch. Shade was not common, but I took advantage of the little bit I did find. I was carrying 4L of water and drank every single one of them. There is NO water along this stretch between Cardenas and Escalante Creek.
I didn’t spend any time at Escalante Creek, I kept moving. With the water level so low it had a massive beach area. I’m not really sure what this would look like at normal water levels.
If you were taking a very long, leisurely trip along this route it’d be a great stopping point. It’s maybe 5-miles from Cardenas, and separates the hot, dusty trail. Not much shade here at all.
75-Mile Canyon
I had heard 75-Mile Canyon was worth the effort to get to it, and I competely agree! Your first obstacle is this wall, it looks worse than it is. There is no obvious route, so just take your time and work your way back and forth. I would not want to tackle it if it were wet though, at that point just sliding down is probably easier.
Once in the Canyon you just wander along and make your way down to the River. The shade was nice, and the views stunning. This would certainly make a nice place to rest and recharge.
I met two guys along the river as I was resting and having a snack. Kevin and Ky from California, they came down Hance and heading up Tanner. We talked about food and wine, and they reminded me is was St Patrick’s Day, which I had completely forgotten. They packed in some good Irish whiskey to celebrate with tonight. Great to talk with you guys!!
All day I had seen 3 hikers behind me, quite a ways back but slowly gaining on me. I saw them come in, get water, and they kept going. Quick little mountain goats.
It was mid-afternoon at this point, I decided to push on the extra mile to Papago Creek. The first portion is just a sandy beach, basically just follow the river best you can. If there was an actual trail here I didn’t really see it.
As I was continuing on I ran into the NPS crew! I’m not sure where they spent last night but it was neat to see them again. I was envious of the rafting crew’s setup – the same 3-burner Camp Chef camp stove I have at home, setup and ready to roll, and a really cool hammock setup on one of the rafts. I’m sure they were going to have a nice St Patty’s Day feast. I hope they enjoyed the rest of their journey.
Once off the sandy beach it turns into these massive boulders, you just have to navigate your way through it. Just take your time and it’s not too difficult.
Papago Creek
I setup camp at Papago Creek in a nice little pocket of scrub brush. I picked the site mostly because of a large piece of driftwood that made a great place to sit. I heard voices so went over to say hi, and to ensure I didn’t scare the hell out of someone if they didn’t hear me come in. It was the group of mountain goats I had seen earlier, they just kind of looked at me like some weird old man, so I just went back to my camp. ha ha
I of course had a snack of salami and cheese. Oh so good.
As I was doing camp chores and finally took my boots off I saw my boots had some damage, the rubber sole was separating from the bottom of my boot! Oh boy, this wasn’t going to fare well. I did not have any kind of shoo goo in my kit, but thankfully did have Tenacious Tape. I was able to tape it under and up the sides, which held up for the rest of the hike.
Dinner tonight was Greek Turkey Lentil Skillet that was excellent. I had made this at home for dinner a few times and thought it would make a great backpacking meal. I was right! I had dehydrated it as a complete meal (without the feta), it rehydrated really well and retained all the flavors. Very filling and flavorful meal.
Papago Wall
I was camped in the shadows of the infamous Papago Wall. This is one of those obstacles you read about, watch videos on and it builds up anxiety. Even with all of that I wasn’t sure what to expect. I enjoyed my dinner and just looked at it, it’s actaully a really neat section of the trail. I did walk over to it at one point and kind of looked at it and the route options up.
Tomorrow this will be the first thing I do to start the hiking day.
It was a crystal clear evening, at one point I had woken up in the middle of the night so attempted to get a shot of the stars. It’s amazing what you can see without all the light pollution of populated areas.
Route Map and Retrospective
I covered just over 8.5 miles today, around 7-hours of hiking time. Lots of ups and downs today, and just hot. The trail was easy to follow, I had no issues at all from a navigation perspective. Good, long day for sure.
