Last week I had been debating whether or not to drive up to the Vernal area to do some hiking, geocaching, and sightseeing, and Thursday I finally made up my mind to do it. There is a geocache on Marsh Peak northwest of Vernal that was placed more than three years ago, but nobody had gone to find it, until Saturday. Since I was going to be in the area, I really wanted to visit Fantasy Canyon too. I figured it would take me the better part of two days, so I packed enough stuff for two nights.

I left home after work on Friday, and it took me 4.5 hours to get near where I'd planned on camping. I was actually about 1.7 miles short of my intended camping spot, but the road was really rough and daylight was fading quickly, so I pulled over at the nearest flat spot alongside the road. I fixed dinner which consisted of hotdogs roasted over a propane stove, potato chips, and iced tea. After eating, it was too dark to do anything useful. I took a few pictures of the full moon, then tried to go to sleep in the truck. I was too chickenshit to set up the tent--didn't want to get mistaken for a meal by a hungry bear. I don't think I slept continuously for more than 30 minutes at any time during the night, but after 8:00 sometime the next morning I felt rested enough to get my day started.

I ate a quick breakfast of a bagel and coffee, then packed everything back up in the truck and tried driving a little closer to the trailhead for Marsh Peak. I only got another 3/4 of a mile before pulling over and beginning to hike, since I could walk faster than I could drive on the rocky road. I parked at a fork in the road, but I ended up hiking down a different fork than I had told Traci I'd be taking, so I left a note on a wooden post saying which fork I'd taken.

The hike was mildly steep for the first mile and a half along what was mostly a 4WD road. At the next road junction, there was a trail sign for Marsh Peak, and the route turned into an ATV trail which continued for almost another mile before turning into a steep, rocky foot trail. The trail was well marked with cairns, and after it leveled out again it curved around the south side of Marsh Peak. I kept following the trail, thinking that it would eventually lead to the summit, but it appeared to keep going west. When I got directly south of the summit, I turned to the north and started the steep ascent.

Near the top, there are two buildings that used to house radio equipment, but they've been long abandoned and heavily vandalized. After checking the buildings out, I pressed on to the summit and reached it about three hours after starting the hike. The geocache was supposed to be under some rocks near the cairn at the summit, but since the entire mountain was nothing more than a big pile of rocks, I couldn't find it easily. After looking for more than an hour, another hiker popped over the ridge to the east and was making his way toward me. When he got closer, he said, "You must be Dennis!" At first I was freaked out that he knew my name, until I remembered the note I had left near the truck. I talked to him for about 45 minutes, then he pressed on and I resumed my search. I finally spotted the cache, not really that far from where my GPS zeroed out, but hidden in such a way that you could only see it from a certain angle. I'd spent 2.5 hours looking for the thing, but seeing as how I'd come all that way just to find it, I didn't want to give up easily.

After signing the log in the cache, I headed straight down the east side of the mountain. There was no trail, and it was much rockier than the southern slope, and I had to carry Torrey for about half the distance down to the main trail. I got back to the truck in an hour and 45 minutes, and hurriedly started making my way back down the rocky road. When I got to a place overlooking Vernal, I had spotty reception on my phone, but I called Traci to let her know I was coming down off the mountain. I told her I was planning on driving toward Fantasy Canyon, which is southeast of Vernal, but I didn't think I could make it there before dark and I was probably going to camp somewhere along the way.

To my surprise, the road to Fantasy Canyon was paved for all but the last few miles (I had expected more gravel and dirt roads), and I made really good time (I think just over three hours). I had enough time to eat a quick dinner of canned chili, and I still had 30 minutes before the sun went down. I hiked quickly around the area and took a lot of pictures of the rock formations and the setting sun. By the time it was dark, I had explored all of the area and had no other reason to stick around, so I decided to high-tail it home.

I called Traci from Vernal just before 10:00 pm and told her that I was on my way home. I didn't pull into the driveway until after midnight, and I was too exhausted to even shower. I just brushed my teeth, hit the pillow, and slept for 10 hours straight.

I did something a little foolish (but fun!) yesterday. Somebody had placed a geocache on the island at Scofield Reservoir, and I wanted to be the first to find it, so I took my little kiddie raft up there and tried rowing out to it. Mark came with me, and we had planned on taking turns rowing out while the other sat on the beach. The closest we could get to the island from shore was 0.75 miles, so it would have been a 1.5 mile round trip. I didn't quite get halfway to the island before I heard air escaping from the raft, so I quickly turned around and rowed back to shore and made it back without losing much air in the raft. I'm not sure I would have made it all the way to the island anyway because my arms and back were already very sore. I'll bet I looked pretty funny to all the boaters who were out on the water. I'd like to make another try with a rented canoe sometime this week, but I'm not sure that's gonna happen because I'm working all week, and evenings aren't a good time to be out on the water in a small craft. My next two weekends are booked, so if the cache is still not found in the next three weeks, I'll definitely get another chance at it.

The Dry Canyon route from Bruin Point to Nine Mile Canyon is much like the Cottonwood Canyon route, except the road is very narrow and steep, and you'd be in trouble if you encountered another vehicle heading in the opposite direction. I enjoyed the scenery through Dry Canyon today, but I spent most of the drive worrying about running into somebody coming up the road. Other than that, this weekend's drive was similar to last weekend's. We only placed one geocache, at Bruin Point, but didn't do a lot of hiking or make too many stops. We were gone from home for nearly 12 hours, and the kids were surprisingly well-behaved for a road trip that long. After all the action of the past two weekends, I don't think I'll be doing much outdoorsy stuff away from home until the Potter's Ponds geocaching get-together in mid-August. After that I'll be more than ready for the cooler temps of fall and a return to the desert.

I bought a little kiddie pool today for the dog. She wasn't sure what to do with it at first, but after a short time she started playing and having a lot of fun. I got the idea after seeing a YouTube video of somebody's Brittany playing in a pool. We've had problems with Torrey playing in the irrigation ditch that runs through the back yard, and I thought the pool would keep her out of the ditch, but apparently that's not the case--she played in the ditch twice today after playing in the pool. Here's some video of her in the pool.

I also finally poured a concrete slab for her dog house this evening. I estimated that I'd need 10 bags of concrete, I bought 12 bags, and I ended up using 11 bags. It didn't go as well as the last time I worked with concrete. I couldn't get the edging tool to smooth the edges. Instead it just tore them up, so I quit trying to use it and smoothed out the rough spots with a small trowel. I also was going to let the kids and the dog leave their hand/paw prints, but I think I waited too long and it was already too set up by the time we tried to do it.

I've already decided to head back to Nine Mile Canyon via Dry Canyon this weekend. Traci and the kids are coming along this time, but Mark is on call for work so he and Samantha can't make it. It would have been more fun with somebody else in another vehicle along, but we'll still have a good time.

Yesterday's trip was great, but I only did about half of what I wanted to. I picked up Samantha and Mark at 8:30 in the morning and we hit the road on our way up toward East Carbon. I'd only been up as far as Water Canyon before, so the drive up to Bruin Point was all new to me. The road was steep and winding, but the view just got better as we climbed. Bruin Point was the highest part of the drive at about 10,100 feet, and you can normally see out into the San Rafael Swell from there, but with all the wildfires around here you couldn't see nearly that far. The temperature was extremely pleasant, though it gradually got unbearable as we drove north along West Tavaputs Plateau and lost elevation.

Shortly after the landscape turned from pine and aspen to juniper and pinyon pine, we stopped at an old dirt landing strip and placed a geocache. After that point the road dropped 1,700' over the next four miles, and we ended up in Cottonwood Canyon. The geology changed a lot there, from smooth plant covered hills to jagged and barren rock cliffs and spires. It was there that we again started seeing signs of civilization--big trucks hauling water and drilling equipment. Once we reached the first petroglyph panel, we started seeing more tourists as well, but there weren't many. I'm sure the hot weather kept most of them away.

We stopped at the mouth of Daddy Canyon for lunch. The BLM has added vault toilets and a pavilion with picnic tables there. It was nice to sit in the shade while eating lunch, but the noisy compressor station and the heavy truck traffic along the road detracted from the beauty of the place. Nine Mile Canyon has changed a lot since I was last there five years ago.

Instead of returning home through Dry Canyon and back over Bruin Point, we stayed on the Nine Mile road and headed toward home--there wouldn't have been enough daylight left to complete that part of the trip. We took a short detour into Gate Canyon, where I placed another geocache near a sandstone arch. The rest of the drive home was less interesting for me because I'd already been on that stretch of road a few times. We stopped to find a couple of geocaches, but other than that the ride home consisted of bouncing along the rough road and dodging semi trucks hauling equipment in the opposite direction or heading back to town empty.

The entire drive was about 113 miles and took 10 hours, and I burned a little over a half a tank of fuel in the truck. I'd really like to go back and try the Dry Canyon route. I'd imagine that it's a lot like the Cottonwood Canyon route (since the two canyons run parallel through the same geology), only different.

I'd hoped to go on a long drive through the mountains last weekend but there was nobody who could go with me, and I was too chicken shit to go alone. It would have been well over 100 miles on dirt roads, mostly 4x4 or high-clearance roads with a couple of short jaunts on gravel. If all goes according to plan, I'll be making the drive this Saturday instead.

Since I didn't do much last Saturday, I decided to take the long way to pick Traci up from her family reunion on Sunday. It would normally have taken me half an hour to get to where they were camped in Huntington Canyon, but I took a four hour detour around Desert Lake, through Buckhorn Wash, and to another area southeast of Castle Dale to do some geocaching. Getting to a couple of the geocaches required a short hike, and it was the first time I'd walked with Torrey off-leash for any great distance. She did well, sticking fairly close to me without wandering off out of my sight, but it was just too damned hot to be out in the desert.

It will be nice to get outdoors this weekend and be out of the heat of the valleys, but the drive will only top out at just over 10,000 feet. According to the National Weather Service forecast it will be 18° cooler at that elevation, so it will surely be worth the effort getting there.