Shenanigans May 16, 2015

[Matthew_R]

I have wanted to explore the canyons in the North Wash area for a while, but it always seemed like something was getting in the way......SCHOOL! Now that the school year is now over, and graduation has come and gone, it was time to get out and explore. With such a short notice, I could only find one other person to join me on the adventure this time. We drove down from Salt Lake City on Friday night, and finally got to the Sandthrax campsite around midnight, set up camp, and immediately went to sleep. It lightly rained the entire night, not letting up until about 4am. We woke up at 6:30 and were on the trail by 8am.

Our plan was to hike from the campsite up to Shenanigans, and combine it with Middle Leprechaun to make a big loop back to camp. It seemed like an efficient route and with only a small sedan, we wouldn't have to drive on the dirt roads, especially after the rain the night before. In total it took about 2.5 hours to get to the first drop in Shenanigans from our campsite. This was the first time for both of us doing Shenanigans, and after reading other descriptions and looking at pictures from different sources, we soon realized that the canyon was going to have a lot more water in it than we were expecting, even given the recent rains. The first rappel landed us in water up to our knees. The canyon was wet almost the entire way through, with a swimmer of about 20 feet in the first narrows section. The going was a bit slower than expected, but still incredibly enjoyable. A wet suit of any kind still would have been overkill, but the swimmer was colder than expected. The one thing that we were worried about after seeing all the water was what the conditions would be in the last narrows section where you can't really travel up off the floor of the canyon. What if the water was so deep that we couldn't touch the floor? How would we pass the already daunting skinny section of the canyon? Still, we carried on. The canyon is much more colorful and sculpted than I was expecting. I just recently bought a rugged point and shoot camera so I wasn't used to stopping to take pictures. But I did my best. I had to keep reminding myself to take a second and try to capture the beautiful scenery all around me. We took a break just before entering the final narrows, and had some snacks, preparing mentally for what was to come. Soon we got to the Grim Crawl. There was no deadman anchor that we saw, so I provided a meat anchor and then made the crawl and downclimb to the canyon floor. We soon reached the skinny section of the canyon and were relieved that there was no standing water to be found. Just a lot of wet sand and mud. Eventually we made it to the final rappel, and neither of us were able to avoid the cold swim of the final pool, but it didn't bother us too much since we were already wet from the waist down.

After exiting, we found that the rain had saturated the sand so much that we both sank up to our knees in some places. At least there was plenty of water to wash ourselves clean of the wet sand. We exited the canyon around 4:00pm. As we made our way down canyon to the kelsey exit, it became clear that we weren't going to be able to do Middle Leprechaun. The clouds were getting darker and it was clear that rain was eminent. We decided instead to exit down Butler wash to the road, and walk back to camp. By the time we got to the road, it was raining pretty good and we felt even better about our decision. We ended up hitching a ride back to camp, only to realize that our sleeping bags were both soaked after a partial collapse of our tent, so we packed up and headed to Hanksville for some grub, then home to a warm, welcoming bed. The trip didn't go exactly as expected, but it seems that some of the best memories are the ones that come unexpectedly. Great canyon!
5/16/2015

Here is a link to a video I made of the trip:
http://youtu.be/BgDFVNFIEmM


We tried to avoid the water in the beginning, but found it to be an unnecessary use of energy.
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Swimmer in the First Narrows
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One benefit of having water in the canyon: the light reflecting on to the canyon walls.
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Going through the labyrinth-like section
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It's getting tight!
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Canyon:1
Hiking Shoes: 0
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Me Starting the downclimb after the Grim crawl
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Almost Out!
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Looking back at the exit
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Quicksand:1
Me: 0
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Cool arch along the exit.
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Thanks for reading, and always remember to take a moment to pause and LOOK UP!

-Matthew

[Sandstone Addiction]

Opps, just saw the other thread....