Sin City weekend in Ice Cube Canyon

Ice Cube Canyon, (The Maze) 3BIV
Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area
8/9/14

 

Vegas, it’s where two swinging bachelors run away to for the weekend. Well, we aren’t exactly swinging bachelors and this isn’t exactly your typical Vegas weekend. No Blackjack, strip clubs, Penn and Teller and all you can eat buffets on this 48- hour romp in Sin City. Well actually, there was not one, but two all you can buffets that were hit up, but the marquee event of the weekend was a descent of Ice Cube Canyon, also known as the Maze in the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area, just 20 miles from the Strip.

Its late on a Friday night and Eric and I roll into a second rate resort and casino, on the outskirts of Vegas, not far from the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area. Despite my online reservation we are given keys to a smoking room. I object, but am told it is all they have available. I try to guilt them in to giving us some sort of comps. I am told this isn’t the Strip and they don’t do comps. I walk away with keys in hand and tail between legs. I am a real high roller. We enter our room and it smells almost as bad as the casino floor where at midnight droves of senior citizens are smoking Pall Malls while playing the slots. I am annoyed but know in less than 8- hours I will be a world away.

No car shuttle for us, so we will have to make the 3500 ascent by foot. We hit the trail early to beat the worst of the heat. By the time the sun gets to us we are at elevation and the temperatures are quite manageable. The scenery is vast, really giving a sense to the size of wilderness in Nevada. We top out and cross the ridge, the entire Strip and its one of a kind skyline clearly visible. We drop into Ice Cube Canyon and immediately encounter an enormous group. I don’t recall their exact numbers, but it was approaching a baker’s dozen. Eric and I decide to delay putting on our wetsuits so we can get a jump and get in front of this group. When we wade into the first pool of water it is entirely comfortable. We reach a swimmer, submerge, exit and not a single chill in the body. We keep moving and soon realize the wetsuits we brought are unnecessary. We turn a few rappels into challenging down climbs and that group is long behind us.

It’s just us and the canyon now. Its spectacular and way skinnier than I was expecting. The down climbs keep coming and they are not easy. Normally water this clear and fresh is bone chilling. Recent monsoon rains and warm temps have created the perfect conditions for dark, slotty, Class B canyoneering. The canyon opens up for awhile affording outstanding views of the surrounding countryside. The canyon narrows again with more swims and rappels. We pass the keeper of Ice Cube Canyon, a massive skull and horns of a Big Horn sheep. It sits on a ledge and may weigh 40 pounds. Its size and weight keep it in place and deter it from becoming a Vegas souvenir, just the way it should be. A rappel, hallway, rappel sequence brings us to the desert floor. We boulder hop to pavement, stash our packs under a tree and jog the approximately two miles in the stifling triple digit temps. That is Eric’s idea, but I was all on board. It is an agonizing 20 minutes

Back at the resort, a shower, a few pre-game cocktails and these two bachelors are ready to hit the town. An all-you-can-eat buffet, some poker and a few laps around the casino floor and we are in bed by 11pm. Like I said not your typical Vegas weekend.

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Eric on the approach.

Reaching the ridge above Ice Cube Canyon.

Eric on a tough down climb early in the canyon.

Eric exits a pothole.

Plenty of beautiful scenery.

Eric rappels….

and pulls the rope.

Not living.

Also not living in Ice Cube Canyon.

Eric in a beautiful hallway in Ice Cube Canyon in the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area.

Eric moves through a gorgeous section of canyon. Looks like some good rock climbing potential here.

Portrait in front of the cave section.

On the final rappel.

Superman.

For some reason we decided to run the 2- miles to retrieve our car in triple digit temps. You can see Ice Cube Canyon (background left).

Deep in the Big Ditch Day 4 – Floating down river & ascending 150-Mile Canyon

A different sort of day this one. For starters, it begins by water not land with a nearly five mile float down the Colorado River. After spending three days battling immense and uneven terrain slowly and tediously by foot, heavy loads on back, this portion of the trip represents the sweet reward for our toils. The mighty Colorado does the work as we sit back and seamlessly watch the world from 5000 feet below, sail by. So excited, I inflated my packraft the night before. Besides what would make a better pillow. In the morning I wake to discover my “pillow” is a third deflated. I am unable to locate the slow leak in the nearby pool at the bottom of the trickle waterfall at Olo Canyon. I can only hope the leak is so slow it will not too greatly effect the seaworthiness of my vessel. We walk across the beach, backpacks around one shoulder and packrafts and paddles held in the other hand. Life vests are strapped down and packrafts tempered to the 46 degree temperature of the water for maximum inflation. I clumsily board my little boat, my backpack on my lap, my lanky legs hanging out of the sides. I dig my “spatulas” into the water and sand and away we go.

Being so low in the water you feel every undulation, riffle, current and eddy. Its power remarkable. We keep the boats straight and true through the first set of riffles and the water calms. We can relax as the river takes us like a tracking shot on a camera mounted dolly through this magnificent scenery. A herd of maybe 10 big horn sheep run on the rocky slopes above the banks of the river along with us for nearly a mile.

It is not entirely a free ride even on the calm water. Currents can come out of nowhere and it would not take much to eject us from our tiny and flimsy boats. Taking a swim in the 45 degree water would be very serious. As we hear the approaching Matkatamiba rapid we move closer to the north shore. Just before the rapid (we decided earlier in the trip not to run it after scouting it) we dock in individual pockets between shoreline boulders. We exit our boats and portage around the rapid, reentering the river in the riffles just below. We float by a rafting party breaking camp at the Matkat Hotel. I want to say they look at us with perplexity, but they are too far away and I can’t see beyond their waves. Four and a half miles is over very quickly and we leave the marine world behind to return to that of feet on rock and dirt.

150-Mile Canyon, 3BVI
Grand Canyon National Park
05/04/13

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A break in the cliffs allows us a layer several hundred feet above the shoreline. At times we use existing bighorn trails, at others we negotiate exposed, chossy and off-camber terrain as we negotiate down river to get into 150- Mile Canyon via a ledge above the Muav Narrows. The ledge is also somewhat precarious forcing us to our bellies in one place to negotiate the narrow ledge maybe a 100- feet above the canyon bottom. Once on solid ground in the bottom of 150- Mile Canyon we begin heading up-canyon for our ticket out of here. The drops that we rappelled on the way down will either be bypassed using shelves above the narrows or we will have to ascend using the rope we left behind.

After a long a bypass hundreds of feet above the narrows below we drop back down to the canyon bottom. At the next dryfall we reach the first set of cord left behind. Instead of leaving a rope at each of the drops, lighter parachute cord was left behind. We attach our rope to the cord and pull the rope into place so we can ascend the drops. To save weight we brought only two sets of ascending gear between the five of us. After the first jug we break into teams to tackle the next three ascents, all of them featuring awkward boulder chokestones at the top that are challenging to get above and around. The jugs are separated by beautiful narrows in shifting light that because of our direction of travel look entirely different than on the way down. The final obstacle out of the Redwall narrows features an exposed but not too difficult 100- foot climb. Shortly after topping out on the rim of the Redwall, I hear Mark who is ahead shout something. I can not make out the words. I then immediately see a Bighorn Sheep sprint right past me right on the edge of the cliff into the narrows.

The Bighorn close encounter was one last treat before the three hour, 2000 plus foot slog to the rim above, much of it in the full force of the afternoon sun. The accumulation of the last four days is being felt now. Nothing to do but put one foot in front of the other until you are there. Upon reaching our vehicles Brian, Cody and Mark make preparations to hit the road and try to make it to Kanab before all of the restaurants stop serving  dinner. Eric and I, on the other hand came prepared, having brought food and beer that remarkably is still ice cold in our coolers left behind. Our plans include eating mass quantities of food, washed down with a few brews and then sleeping. Driving can wait until tomorrow. With hugs goodbye, the team separates. Eric and I mosey over to a massive vista of the Grand Canyon landscape below. We marvel at its size. Though we just explored a considerable chunk of this wilderness it is a a mere drop in this truly grand bucket.

-David

Eric carries his packraft to the river.

Mark floats down the Colorao River.

David takes on some riffles.

Cody and Eric use a bighorn trail above the Colorado River.

Eric ascends a drop.

David ascends a drop.

Mark ascends a drop

Brian walks through the Redwall narrows.

Cody jugs as Mark looks on from above.

Brian bridges to stay dry.

Eric in beautiful narrows and beautiful light.

Brian and Eric climbing up narrows.

Cody ascends another drop.

David free climbs out of the Redwall.

A bighorn sheep runs right past us on the rim of the Redwall.

The upper reaches of 150-Mile Canyon.