After playing at Goblin valley and eating lunch, we drove the few miles to Little Wildhorse Canyon - a scenic, fun, and easy (walking) slot canyon hike. We hiked it years ago with the kids, now it was time for Kara and Kade to have the experience.
After walking a ways up an open wash the canyon begins to narrow and eventually "slot up". There were a few short sections of shallow water (a first, it's always been dry before).
Around one bend we found 3 large chunks of ... snow! Pretty weird to find snow in this parched landscape, but there it was. I assume it had built up in the bottom of the canyon over the Winter and these were the last remnants.
We negotiated the water spots and made it to where the canyon opens up. The deep grotto with rock walls made a great echo chamber, which we tested extensively. Then we turned around and went back. (The other option was to continue up-canyon and cross over and descend Bells Canyon immediately to the south, but that adds a lot more miles.)
Skirting the water, or is it chocolate milk?
Hoping the placed rocks to stay dry.
The rock features are lovely and varied.
We'd hiked quite a bit this trip and the kids were dragging on the way down the canyon, but they kept moving and didn't complain much.
Kade scrapped his knee (again) so I carried him on my shoulders for close to a mile until the magical bandaids, with their healing / anesthetic powers, reached full potency.
Back at the van we headed for home. After Brad's incident I was extra alert driving Spanish Fork Canyon in the dark. I usually let one or more cars get in front of me - let them be the deer plows (is this wrong?).
This was a great trip. We saw lots of fantastic sights, had plenty of play - lots of smiles and laughs.
The End
2 years ago
2 comments:
Those canyons look fantastic! I've never had the opportunity to get down that way and explore them, but it's definitely on my bucket list!
Southern Utah is a trove of treasures like Little Wildhorse.
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