Painted Horse
04-28-2013, 09:18 PM
We rode the horses into the Outlaw Camp in Robbers Roost this weekend. We camped at Blue John Springs in the quality motel that is available to first come.http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p259/Painted-Horse/2013/Motel.jpg (http://s130.photobucket.com/user/Painted-Horse/media/2013/Motel.jpg.html)We also made use of their high quality corrals to keep the horses in.http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p259/Painted-Horse/2013/Corral.jpg (http://s130.photobucket.com/user/Painted-Horse/media/2013/Corral.jpg.html) In the morning we headed across Blue John and then across the area known as the pasture. And found the old short cut into Fortress Canyon.http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p259/Painted-Horse/2013/Cory.jpg (http://s130.photobucket.com/user/Painted-Horse/media/2013/Cory.jpg.html) We scrambled down the steep sides and quickly learned why the posses never followed the outlaws into this area.http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p259/Painted-Horse/2013/Dropping-Inn.jpg (http://s130.photobucket.com/user/Painted-Horse/media/2013/Dropping-Inn.jpg.html) We followed down Fortress until we found a route up and over the ridge and dropped down into HorseShoe Canyon. http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p259/Painted-Horse/2013/Slick-Rock.jpg (http://s130.photobucket.com/user/Painted-Horse/media/2013/Slick-Rock.jpg.html) From here we headed up the canyon until we found the spring below the outlaw camp. We had lunch in the shade of the trees near the spring. After lunch we climb the hill up to the shelf where the old camp was located. There are still a few old rusty cans that help you to know you found the camp. The outlaws always had multiple routes in and out of thei camps and we proceeded to take the trail out the back of the camp and wandered down to the second outlaw camp at the lower springs a mile or so down the canyon. We again watered our horses. Several of the folks in our group were not excited about climbing back up out of Fortress canyon the way they had come in, So we followed Horse shoe canyon down to the lower entrance that most folks use. It's a big sandy hill that horses had to work hard to scramble up. This detour added about six miles to our total for the day. We saw lots of wild donkeys in the area, a few Mule deer and of course the assortment of hawks, crows, squirrels and other high desert life. This is a very remote area, there are very few signs of others humans traveling this area. There are no real trails, You just wander where you can, maybe following foot tracks from donkeys or deer. In total it was 21 miles to make the loop and an excellent day.