Spring 2024 Southwestern Swing, 4.01.24 - 5.06.24, Part 14, Paria Townsite, Wire Pass/Buckskin Gulch

Bt the time we left Page, Arizona, we had been on the road for the better part of a month. We had left Lake Stevens on April 1st and on April 28th we were headed for Kanab, Utah for our final base camp before heading for home. This final week would not only include some of the most exciting and adventuresome excursions of the trip, but we were also looking forward to meeting up with several friends during this stretch.

The drive from Page to Kanab is only a little over an hour along highway 89. We picked up a few groceries and topped off the propane in the Navibahn before settling in at the Kanab RV Corral on the south side of town. This was a very nice but quaint RV park and we highly recommend it! At the grocery store we met up with Gina. She is an old high school friend who has traveled with us on several trips including our amazing overnighter at White Pocket in 2022. She had a motel room just minutes from our campground.

Two other friends, Debbie and Darren, had already arrived and were camped just across from us in the same campground. They used to live in Lake Stevens but had moved to St. George a couple of years ago. A short time later my good friend Mike arrived. He is also a high school friend and moved to Steamboat Springs after graduating. Mike had been exploring around the San Rafael Swell before coming to meet up with us in Kanab.

Around three that afternoon we all headed out for a sunset dinner picnic. Driving back on 89 about thirty miles or so, we turned off and headed north on the Paria Movie Road. Following a good dirt road, the scenery just got better with each mile. At around the four mile mark we found Mike who had driven ahead earlier to find a free campsite. His spot was incredible. It was just a bit off the main dirt road and had a million dollar view.

A short mile later we came to a picnic area near the old Paria Townsite. We were situated along the Paria River and the mountains and ridges that rose above the river and this valley are so spectacular they are unofficially called the Rainbow Mountains. They particularly live up to their name when the sun is setting and the late evening light really makes the beautiful striped strata pop with color. We intended to hang out until sunset but the clouds were thicker than I would have liked so more often than not the mountains were in shadow.

I thought that the views were better back a little way up higher on the ridge so after we ate we moved up to a nice spot on top of the ridge with a commanding view looking up the valley of the Paria River. After shooting some photos there, we found an even better spot just a short way further back and just hung around while the sun sank lower in the sky. We did get some nice sun breaks but the clouds were too thick for it to give us direct sun on the horizon. I still got some nice shots and it was a very scenic evening.

I woke up full of anticipation the next morning. On this day our plan was to hike through the Wire Pass slot canyon and then hike a ways into Buckskin Gulch. This hike has been on my radar for many years, probably since the late eighties when I first began to venture into the southwest. As I mapped out a plan for where to go on this trip, a hike into Buckskin Gulch was easily the main reason I chose to include Kanab as part of our route.

Buckskin Gulch is located on the Utah/Arizona border in the Vermilion Cliffs National Monument. It is one of the main tributaries of the Paria River which feeds into the Colorado River at Lee’s Ferry. It is known to be the longest and deepest slot canyon in the world, stretching over thirteen miles. There is a trailhead for Buckskin Gulch along the House Rock Valley Road but since the upper portion of Buckskin Gulch has less exciting features, we opted to drive a bit beyond that trailhead and park at the Wire Pass Trailhead.

We got to the trailhead around seven-thirty and there were already several cars there. This was not surprising. In addition to this hike being quite popular, it is also the trailhead for one of the most sought after permits in the world, the hike to The Wave. The Wave is an insanely picturesque area where bright red slickrock covered in symmetrical lines curving to follow the shape of the rounded rock create a bowl-like “wave”. It has been immortalized on every Windows computer screen, on Instagram and all over Facebook to the point where in an effort to protect the fragile area from being completely overrun, you now need a permit to go there. A very limited number of permits are issued four months in advance and a few more are issued on a daily basis. I had tried to get an advanced permit and with the odds of getting one hovering around 3%, I wasn’t surprised to fail at that endeavor. I also tried to get a daily permit while we were there but that also failed. I wasn’t too discouraged. I had a great Plan B in mind, but I will keep trying for a permit and hopefully one of these times we will manage to snag one.

For the Wire Pass/Buckskin Gulch hike, we also needed a day use permit, but those are unlimited and it was easy to get one online the night before. Mike had opted out of this hike since he had already done it years ago as a backpack trip. Instead, he went for a bike ride. Gina, Debbie, Darren, Bridgit and I hit the trail. Wire Pass is another side canyon the extends into Buckskin Gulch. It is not super long, under two miles to the junction with Buckskin Gulch. Our goal was to hike through Wire Pass and then head down into Buckskin Gulch a ways to make it a 5.6 mile out and back.

The Wire Pass Trail began in a wide wash. There was a bit of deep sand but mostly it was easy travel. After several turns in the wash we came to where another trail veered off. This was the trail to the Wave. Someday…

A bit further down the wash we had a rare treat. Less than thirty feet in front of us, two beautiful desert bighorn sheep bounded across the wash right in front of us and then stopped on the hill next to the wash to nibble on some leaves. I quickly grabbed my telephoto lens. I would have been shooting more into the sun so I slowly walked a bit further down the wash until I was past them. Now I was able to shoot them so that the sun was shining on their coats. They had incredible curled racks and we all just watched them for several minutes before they finally moved on. Later when I told this story to my friend Gary, he said he had been down that wash maybe seven times and up and down the House Rock Road dozens of times and never seen a desert bighorn, so we really felt fortunate to have experienced these beautiful animals.

Still buzzing from the incredible wildlife sighting, we continued down Wire Pass. On our right we came to another junction. Inside the canyon we knew there was a ten foot dropoff. Usually there is a ladder there but after rains, the canyon floods and often washes away the ladder. This junction is before the canyon dropoff and is a bypass route that climbs up out of the wash, traverses the hillside to a point beyond the dropoff and then makes its way back down into the canyon. We had recent information that the ladder was in place so we continued.

Just beyond the beginning of the bypass route the wash narrows up and very abruptly we entered a narrow crack in the rock. We were now in a dark tight slot canyon. I love these places. The walls of the canyon were only a few feet apart. Almost immediately, we came to the dropoff. A couple of huge rocks wedged into the slot canyon created a drop of about ten feet to the floor below. A very sturdy ladder had been installed there with ten rungs to climb down to get beyond the pour-off.

**This is where the open wash enters the slot section of Wire Pass**

The rest of the Wire Pass slot, though not very long, was really fun. It was very narrow and the walls were very high. Slot canyons are like a kid’s playground. They are just so different with twists and turns and bizarre patterns of rock on the walls. Of course they can also be extremely deadly. With absolutely nowhere to escape, a rainstorm miles away can cause these canyons to flash flood where walls of water rush through with no warning. Any time you hike into one of these canyons it is essential that you check the weather for the entire area before venturing in.

**Wire Pass slot canyon. Photo courtesy of Bridgit.**

**Beautiful morning light in Wire Pass slot canyon**

At 1.7 miles from the trailhead we came to a gigantic alcove that marked the confluence with Buckskin Gulch. At this huge alcove the canyon opened up and spilled into Buckskin Gulch. Along the great wall just beyond the alcove were numerous petroglyphs. Out in the open, if you turn left, Buckskin Gulch makes its way upstream a few miles up to the Upper Buckskin Gulch Trailhead on the House Rock Valley Road. I had read that it is not nearly as scenic as turning right and going downstream.

**The Great Alcove where Wire Pass meets Buckskin Gulch**

**Petroglyphs on the wall of the Great Alcove**

**Bighorn petroglyph on the wall of the Great Alcove**

**Looking back into Wire Pass from Buckskin Gulch**

By turning right and heading down into Buckskin Gulch, we could have hiked another ten miles or more all the way to Lee’s Ferry. Our goal was to hike about a mile down the Gulch to another big alcove and a spot called Buckskin Overlook. I’m not sure if the overlook is high above Buckskin Gulch, but that was a marked location on the map and it seemed like a good turnaround point.

Hiking through Buckskin Gulch was a blowaway. In places the walls of the canyon are so close together you can reach out and touch both sides and looking up they are over two hundred feet high. I have hiked the Zion Narrows and personally I thought that Buckskin Gulch had even greater scenic value than the Narrows. It was pretty spectacular.

Sometimes the floor of the canyon was smooth, sometimes covered in bowling ball sized rocks and there were also places with deep sand. Conditions vary all the time. After rains there are places where pools of standing water are so deep you have to swim to get through but that wasn’t the case while we were there. We had great conditions and it was just a wonderful hike.

**The second large alcove at Buckskin Overlook. This is 2.8 miles from the trailhead.**

Altogether we made this a 5.6 mile out and back. I had wanted to hike into Buckskin Gulch for so may years and once I finally did, it not only met my very high expectations, but vastly exceeded them. It is truly an amazing place to see.

Spring 2024 Southwestern Swing, 4.01.24 - 5.06.24, Part 14, Paria Townsite, Wire Pass/Buckskin Gulch

Spring 2024 Southwestern Swing, 4.01.24 - 5.06.24, Part 13, Thousand Pockets

Spring 2024 Southwestern Swing, 4.01.24 - 5.06.24, Part 15, Edmaier’s Secret