Good Ride in Bad Land

Yesterday, we rode up 5 Mile Draw (off of the Wells Draw Road) to the Bad Land Cliffs.  The elk skull above, with the rest of the skeleton nearby, suggests a natural death. Note that the elk horns have been chewed by rodents.  The skull must have been there for a long time.

On the way up, we traveled through grassy meadows.  We spotted an antelope and a coyote.

We found a group of these tiny cactus (flowers about an inch in diameter) growing in a meadow.  I think they're cushion cactus. 

On his lunch break, Boss enjoyed tasty bunch grass under the shade of a huge juniper.

From the top, we looked down on a lot of rough country and into 9 mile canyon, world famous for its abundance of Fremont culture rock art.

Snow, Water, Grass

Where we were riding, the Bad Land Cliffs are about 8000 feet --  high enough to be cool, but low enough to be dry and mostly snow free.  We aimed for the distant patch of snow in the above photo (on the 9000 ft ridge to the right of center), but we didn't make it that far.  There were too many canyons and hills along the way and we didn't want to run out of daylight.

Since Daisy had no snow and we didn't come across any water, I laid my waterproof jacket in a depression and used it as a bowl to give her a drink.  Daisy said thank you as she lapped up most of a liter. 

The horses were satisfied with green grass for lunch, while we ate a snack and admired the wildflowers:

Indian Paintbrush

Double Bladderpod?

Milkvetch species?

On the way back, we saw an antelope.  Daisy gave short chase, but the antelope outdistanced her in no time. 

Coco was ready to go home.  "Hurry up!" he seemed to say when Daisy, Mischief and I dawdled.

Double Barrels and Elk Antlers

On the Bad Land Cliffs, we always see something interesting.

A barrel cactus branches out from the solitary plant we usually see. 

This one's grown a twin. 

Milkvetch species

Double Bladderpod (Mustard family)

We saw plenty of wildflowers, and...

What's that growing on the skeleton juniper tree?  An elk head!?

The antlers are still partially encased in velvet.

No point in wasting the unusual photo frame.

Bad Road to the Bad Land Cliffs

We drove the trailer plus horses up Wells Draw Road to the Five Mile Canyon road.  We hoped to drive as high as we could before we started riding. 

The big snowmelt and wet spring had washed out the road in places. Some washouts were small and could be maneuvered around.  This one (6 feet deep and at least 20 feet wide) stopped us.  The gap could easily have swallowed a pickup and horse trailer whole and burbed its satisfaction. 

Steve suggested using our shovels to fill in the road.  I hope he was joking.  He got absolutely no encouragement from me! 

We did a lot more road riding than we had planned, but that was the only way to get to the ridge.

As we neared the Bad Land Cliffs at about 8000 feet, we came to the Forest Service border where the road narrowed to a sandy two-track.  After a wet spring, nothing about this area seems "bad".  The name Bad Land Cliffs was applied because the area is rugged, eroded (see road photo, to judge how easily the soil washes away!) and too dry for much grazing or habitation.  We like it because there are few real roads and almost no visitation, except by us.  We've seen a few hunters in fall, and the occasional antelope, deer, or elk.

Framed

This was taken in mid-September on Cottonwood Ridge above Indian Canyon (south of Duchesne, Utah).  I was trying to be artsy.

Unfortunately, neither Steve nor Boss cooperated long enough for multiple shots.  (It's really hard to get those guys to be still!)

This is from the same ride, looking toward the long line of skirted hills known as the Bad Land Cliffs.

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No Sleet, but Watch out for Bears

We’ve neglected Indian Canyon this year, and only went there once last year, late in the fall. Unfortunately, snow began falling as soon as we arrived on that occasion. This year, we had better luck. Temperatures were close to 60 as we started out at 7800 feet.

Our trailhead was Spring Hollow. The turnoff onto a dirt road with pulloffs for parking was marked by a sign that, surprisingly enough, said Spring Hollow…

We parked in a scenic grove of cottonwoods beside a running stream.

From there, we followed an old two-track that turned into a trail that was easy to follow for awhile, but became faint. Groves of golden aspen lined the canyon.

We eventually left the trail to travel an “old horse trail” (Steve speak for “no trail”) up the steep hill on the northeast side of the canyon. The going got so rough that we dismounted and led the horses. At the top, we found ourselves on a ridge of the Bad Land Cliffs, about 9000 feet, overlooking Argyle Canyon.

We would have followed the trail on up the ridge to the northwest, but the trail went almost straight up, then traversed along a cliff where one false move would be deadly. No thanks.

Instead, we traveled a trail going southwest.

There was actually a sign up there in the middle of nowhere pointing out Mill Hollow, which was where we wanted to go. We found an easy to follow trail that led all the way back to Indian Canyon.

On the way down, we saw some fairly fresh bear scat. Bear scent always makes Boss nervous. Almost there, he saw something ahead that made him jumpy. He started making the loud snorting noises he reserves for bear scares. He should have been chagrined to discover that what he thought might be bears was just a couple of funny-looking horses.

Our total ride was 9.5 miles, 2450 feet elevation gain, in just under 3 hrs moving time. The weather grew cloudier throughout the day and the wind picked up, but we didn’t get any rain, hail, sleet or snow. That’s always favorable. Water was available in a couple of troughs, one in each canyon. There was pretty good Indian rice and wheat grasses along the trail. Mischief enjoyed stealing a bite now and then.