Exploring southern Utah slot canyons over New Years

[JeremyP]

I took my family on a trip to southern Utah over New years in order to do some desert exploring. Our first day was traveling from western Colorado to Escalante, Utah with a short detour into Capitol Reef national park to hike down capitol gorge. We arrived at the canyon county lodge with 12% and plugged into the tesla destination chargers. It's so great to be able to add 125 kwh overnight! The next day we headed through Cannonville and hiked the Willis creek slot canyon, which was interesting with a layer of ice through most of the narrow sections. We then headed down Cottonwood road, went by Grosvenor arch and hiked the cottonwood narrows. We continued down cottonwood road, which fortunately was dry and fairly smooth, and came out on highway 89 and made a quick stop at the toadstools, an area with interesting rock formations. We stayed in Kanab that night at the LaQuinta which also has tesla destination chargers and really cheap rooms at this time of year! We arrived with the battery at 50% so it was no problem charging back up to 100% overnight.

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[JeremyP]

The next day we went out to Wire Pass, a slot canyon that joins the Buckskin Gulch slot canyon in the Vermillion Cliffs national monument. I aired down to 30psi shortly after getting onto House Rock Valley Road because it had a lot of washboard and loose chunky rock on it. After wire pass we continued south and took blm road 1079/1084/1323/1086 to get to White Pocket, an amazing sandstone area with endless features to explore. The route we took was not recommended on the blm map because of deep sand, so of course I needed to take it! I used snow mode since I gave a dual motor R1S, non-performance and it was no problem going through the sand, although I could tell at certain spots where other vehicles had been stuck in the past. We took blm 1086/1087/1017 out which had much less sand but much more washboard. I didn't air up until back at the motel but still arrived with 48% charge after about 150 miles of highway and offroad.

 

[JeremyP]

More to come

 

[JeremyP]

On our last day we checked out the sand caves just north of Kanab, went through the Best Friends animal sanctuary so the kids could beg for more pets, and went out to peek-a-boo (or red) canyon. The route out to the canyon was much deeper sand than the day before, especially since I took 102L instead of 102 and because it's mostly utv's going out there which are constantly churning the sand and creating super-sized (about 8-12" deep) washboard, always at the run-up to a hill. I started without airing down but soon dropped down to 30 again which makes a huge difference in the sand. After taking route 102 out we aired up and headed to home, charging at the Richfield supercharger enough to make it home 220 miles, which used 80%. As always a trip like this leaves me wanting to go back and explore more!

 

[moosetags]

Great pictures. Thank you for posting.

 

[JeremyP]

Driving out of the lower parking area of White Pocket. After seeing videos of people getting stuck on this hill, it was much less drama than I expected!

 

[JeremyP]

Just for fun, trying to go back up the steep hill I came down into the wash where peekaboo canyon starts. Always hard to get the steepness perspective in a video! The main trail is much easier!

 

[Dave Cundiff]

What amazes me in these photos is the vertiginous disorientation of vertical and horizontal. Without seeing humans in the pictures, sometimes I literally wouldn't know which way is up.

Thanks for sharing, @JeremyP!

 

[VSG]

Nice! Thanks for the trip report. My wife and I did Willis Creek in the spring. Very little water at that time. It was an amazing drive and hike. We took the 500 road up from 89, did the hike then camped at Kodachrome at a hook-up stie to charge - absolutely the best bathrooms of any state park in the country! (You may think that's silly, but only if you've never been there ....)

You just gave me some more places to try! Thanks.

 

[stevieswanderlust]

Thanks for sharing! As a new owner of a R1S these kind of stories are so exciting to hear about. The pics are fantastic!

 

[Ohm Boy]

Thank you for sharing these stunning photos. If you haven’t already shared these with Rivian, I think they would love to see them and maybe even include them in a future newsletter. Your descriptions of the trek are awesome!!

 

[Ohm Boy]

Jeremy, looks like you are from the home town of my grandkids. Prior to de-musk-ifying, we noticed while charging at the Tesla chargers there that a new RAN was going in which was really cool to see. Now on our many trips there we very much enjoy using the operational RAN right next to a Taco Bell, my grandson’s fave. I have gotten a few “differently friendly” looks from local residents while charging there. That is way more than balanced out by my grandkids asking Alexa to add important items to my Amazon shopping list, like poop, fried poop, more poop, poop flambé and the like. Okay, so I added the last one. We were running low…

Again thanks for these amazing photos.

 

[JeremyP]

What amazes me in these photos is the vertiginous disorientation of vertical and horizontal. Without seeing humans in the pictures, sometimes I literally wouldn't know which way is up.

Thanks for sharing, @JeremyP!

That's what's frustrating with taking pictures of these areas; when you're there you can just stare and be amazed, and then you try to capture it in a picture and it's not the same! Here's a good 'spot the person' picture from last week

 

[JeremyP]

Nice! Thanks for the trip report. My wife and I did Willis Creek in the spring. Very little water at that time. It was an amazing drive and hike. We took the 500 road up from 89, did the hike then camped at Kodachrome at a hook-up stie to charge - absolutely the best bathrooms of any state park in the country! (You may think that's silly, but only if you've never been there ....)

You just gave me some more places to try! Thanks.

We wanted to go into Kodachrome but with the short hours of daylight at this time of year (and shorter after trying to get kids moving!) we knew we wouldn't be able to spend enough time there to do it justice. It's good to know they have power and good bathrooms for a future trip!

 

[Ohm Boy]

That's what's frustrating with taking pictures of these areas; when you're there you can just stare and be amazed, and then you try to capture it in a picture and it's not the same! Here's a good 'spot the person' picture from last week

I respectfully disagree about not being able to capture the beauty. Your photos prove this point. Yeah, our eyeballs and brains do a better job. But seriously, your photos are pretty damned excellent. The one you just posted is John Fielder-esque!!

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