Distance > 13 Miles; People Met = 2
Another piece of advice that Randy Gould gave us was to go cross country essentially from where we camped by Antimony Creek to rejoin and ATV road on the other side of a ridge, saving us 1 1/2 miles.
Now I’ve complained about needing to use map and compass to find existing trail on this forum, but intentional orienteering is another matter all together. Even if you do a lousy job you’ve exercised the freedom to plot your own route, and when things fall into place it can be the most gratifying experience of all for a long-distance backpacker. Our cross country route first thing in the morning was a most gratifying experience.
After crossing Antimony Creek along the road we angled upslope towards a pass we could see in the distance. Eventually we detected small drainages and cow paths angling in the same direction. That’s the beauty of when things go right: the best way will be detected by multiple creatures.
Looking Back on Our Cross Country Ascent
Eventually we even hooked up with a path that had to have been at least cleared, if not made, by humans. The ultimate evidence of that was a camp we came upon that was suddenly abandoned; a tarp was collapsed on the ground with frying pans nearby.
Collapsed Camp
At the pass we ran into a two-tracker that was running north-south, but at that point we wanted to go due east to save the most mileage. The climb up was mainly through sagebrush, but ahead now was relatively wide open aspen forest. I got my compass out and simply followed a fixed bearing through a level plateau with little to impede our progress. We came eventually to a barbed wire fence, which we continued to follow east until we reached our ATV road. Ahh! The whole experience was a thing of beauty! Once back on the ATV road we had to share it with the usual crowd.
The Most Typical User of Utah National Forest Land
We saw multiple motorists and ATVers throughout the day, which ended up with following the major Forest Service road that connects Escalante and Loa. During our lunch stop two hunters looking for antelope on their ATVs asked us if we needed any help, a nice gesture on their part.
Concerned Hunters
Our original destination was Cyclone Lake, but lakes out here are a little different than back east. What we found was a marsh so we went a few miles further to camp near Deep Creek. We set up for the rain that obviously was going to come soon, including the sling I now make out of the tent pole bag to keep my constantly swollen left foot elevated.
Make Shift Sling
Then the rain and thunderstorm came, a storm that we later learned would create flash floods with a seven foot wall of water in closed canyons, closing roads in the process. Here’s how such a storm sounds like on the walls of your tent, where we remained dry as a bone in our REI Passage 2:
