California to Canyonlands in a Disco

[kcabpilot]

Next week I'm headed out to Cedar City Utah to meet up with my two brothers and we are going to set out for a week of exploration to include three days on the White Rim Trail. I'm hoping it's not going to be too hot, it hit 103 here today in the valley but is supposed to start cooling down tomorrow.

So to start off, a little bit about my Disco. It's a 2001 SE7 that I've owned for about 7 years. It's basically stock with slightly larger 265/70 series tires. I enabled the center differential lock by installing a Discovery Series 1 transfer case shift lever and I fixed the common "3 Amigos" malady by bypassing the SVS circuit card which is embedded in epoxy and commonly suffers a break in one or both of the circuit traces. This is a tried and proven fix that eliminates the problem. So with a center diff lock and fully functioning electronic traction control it is a pretty capable truck. The only thing it lacks right now in stock form is a proper front recovery point but I'm working on that. I want to keep the front bumper completely stock in appearance.

Many months ago when I started planning this mini expedition I purchased some factory roof rail extenders and after that I installed a rear access ladder. Then I went off the deep end and ordered a Voyager roof rack which is an American made clone of the much admired Safety Devices rack which was a pseudo-clone of the Camel Trophy racks except that the originals where welded to the internal roll cages rather than clamped to the rain gutters. Still, they are quite stout and capable racks so the next thing I know I'm buying a roof top tent and a thinking up all sorts of ways to fill up that real estate. The rooftop tent is kind of controversial. It's not real easy to get it up there and mounted by yourself, although I did manage. It weighs about 120 pounds. And they ain't exactly cheap but there are a lot of Chinese knock-offs on the market now so I bought the cheapest one you can get made by Smittybuilt. How often am I gonna use this thing? Remains to be seen but if I really do get into the RTT scene and it falls apart I'll just upgrade, probably to one of those new clamshell pop-ups they have nowadays.

I've used the tent on three outings so far and it's kind of a mixed bag. It's very comfortable and honestly I don't mind the drawbacks while out dispersed camping in bear country but there are a couple of things. Probably the worst part is putting the travel cover over it after it's folded up, it's a bit of a chore. The Voyager rack helps because it provides all sorts of hand holds and I can stand on the back tire but you have to hold yourself there so you're left with one arm to work with. I'm getting better at it, there's just a method that needs to be worked out and followed. The other well known drawback is the issue of having to relieve yourself in the middle of the night. Believe me, if you've had a few beers or a bottle of wine around the campfire it's easy and safe to get up into the tent but don't try climbing out in the middle of the night when it's pitch black, you need to bring some sort of in tent "device" to accommodate those needs and basically sequester yourself to the tent until daybreak. At least that's how I've approached it and I'm still alive to tell about it.

A few pictures:

So any tips for must sees between Cedar City and Canyonlands I'm all ears. We have a week to get there and so far are planning to follow the Burr Trail and maybe do the Hole in the Rock Road.

 

[kcabpilot]

Before heading out to Utah, which will likely be tomorrow, I wanted to test all of the new equipment out and iron out any bugs or problems that might crop up. So I headed up to Loon Lake which is just west of Lake Tahoe at the end of Ice House Road. This is where the western end staging point is for the Rubicon Trail. Of course I wasn't going to take the Disco on the Rubicon, it's a pretty tough trail and many of the vehicles that do go on it come up here on a trailer. This was the day after Memorial Day weekend so the place was pretty much completely deserted. I only saw a handful of vehicles the whole way up there.

There were however many. many miles of roads like these to explore which are more aligned with what the Disco is set up for.

I came upon this idyllic meadow on a road north of Silver Creek off of Wrights Lake Road

This is a view from the lookout on top of Big Hill looking north east

Looking to the south east

One of the "bugs" that came up was that I had forgotten a few bare essentials like coffee and butter so on the second day I had to make a run into South Lake Tahoe and decided to run up to Emerald Bay since the view never ceases to amaze me.

Every time I drive into SLT this guy has more bears than he did before and I have to wonder if he's ever sold a single one. There must be a thousand of them and he just keeps making more.

On the second night I stayed on the north shore of Loon Lake. It's actually an RV campground but was completely deserted with piles of firewood left there by the holiday weekend crowds that had just left. So I built a smokey pinewood fire to drive off the hoards of mosquitoes and flies that come out as the sun begins to set.

The next day rather than drive back down to highway 50 I followed Wentworth Springs Road to Georgetown. It's a very nice road and a beautiful drive although part of it near Stumpy Meadows goes through a large area that was devastated by wildfire in recent years. The only other traffic I encountered were a couple of logging trucks.

So tomorrow I'm headed off for Utah.

 

[Tucsontom]

Great Photoshop and what a place to be! I bet the nights are nice at White Rim. Cools off quickly.

 

[dakota123]

Nice ! Awesome trip!

 

[motom]

Good looking Disco! Have a great trip!

Check out this thread for some discreet front recovery points: http://www.thed2boysclub.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=28854

 

[kcabpilot]

Day 1

My mission over the next two days is to make it to my brother's place in cedar City. There are several routes to take across the Sierra from here and I've done all of them. This time I decided to take SR4 across Ebbetts Pass to Hwy 89 then across Monitor Pass to 395 then south through Bridgeport and Lee Vining to Hwy 120 east to Nevada 6 then Extraterrestrial Highway through Rachel and on east through Caliente and Panaca to Cedar City.

Into the foothills through the oaks

then the pines

and eventually bare granite

past idyllic alpine lakes

after which the road narrows

putting a smile on my face

up here where the trees are way, way older than any living person

Barkloglyphs left by not so ancient men

This route is popular with motorcyclists for obvious reasons

passed this abandoned old house with a giant kiln. Not sure what went on here at one time in the past.

There a thing called the "Death Ride" where bicyclists ride across three major passes up here, Monarch being the last, in one day

I went down this forest road for a couple of miles to stop and have a late afternoon snack and some quiet time before continuing on.

Coming down the east side of the pass the landscape completely transforms

Passing Mono Lake

As the day ended I needed to find a spot to camp for the night and cook some dinner so I headed out through June Lakes loop which turned out to be a popular resort area and was completely packed with RV's but I did find a very large campground near the southern end that had plenty of open spots. There are lots of residences up there and not the semi-wilderness area I was imagining it to be so it wasn't possible to just drive down a spur road to find a dispersed site and it was getting dark so twenty five bucks later I was grilling a ribeye and heating up a can of beans.

 

[kcabpilot]

Day 2

Up early, packed up and hit the road for the trek across Nevada. I really enjoy early morning on roadtrips.

Nevada - lots of vanishing point highway vistas, what else is there to say about it.

Tonopah, the last bastion of civilization

A few of the standard highlights, I didn't stop at any, been through here before, I just needed to get across.

By mid afternoon I had made it to Cedar City and my brother's place. It was starting to get really hot but he's at 8,000 feet so not so bad up here.

 

[smlobx]

More, More!

 

[kcabpilot]

Day 3 and 4

Day 3 was spent getting the trucks ready for our trip to Canyonlands

On day 4 we made a 260 mile test run down to Toroweap outlook on the north rim of the Grand Canyon and back to Cedar City to see if everything was working like it should

After the ranger station the last six miles of the road get a bit rougher with the last 2 miles slowing you to a crawl

From here it's a short walk to the rim where the views are unnervingly spectacular

It's about 3,000 feet straight down to the river, less than that across to the edge on the other side

No signs, marked paths or guardrails here, get as close to the edge as you dare and I'm sure there are many who have ventured much closer than I had the nerve to

I knew while taking the photos that they could never capture the actual grandeur that I was witnessing

Today we head out towards the White Rim Trail with a few extras in between. Next update will probably not be until end of the week

 

[kcabpilot]

Day 5

Out of Cedar City on Hwy 12 across the mountains, through Duck Village then north on Hwy 89, then east on Hwy 12 past Bryce Canyon N.P. and out to Escalante.

Past Escalante we looked to see if we could get a camping spot at Calf Creek but being the weekend it was full so we backtracked to Hole in the Rock road and took a turn-off about twenty miles down on Harris Wash Road where we found a nice primitive site on top of a hill with great views.

Calf Creek Campground

Headed back west for Hole in the Rock Road

Harris Wash Road

Picturesque campsite

My brother - older, possibly wiser, definitely shorter lol

For those interested, a word about my equipment. I used this Nikon S7000 point and shoot for all of the behind the wheel, on the road shots. It has a 20x zoom and does a pretty good job for quick pictures without much effort in composing. Take a hundred shots and your bound to get ten decent ones.

For the other stuff I used this Nikon D5300 with an 18-55 wide angle/zoom

I bought it to try my hand at astro/landscape photography and to do some time lapse but I really need a wider angle, wider aperture lens to get better results. I also need more practice.

I also tried some light painting techniques with mediocre results. I'll get better at it. This trip was a bit too time constrained for me to really concentrate on it.

The next morning, an awesome sunrise but now we're getting into Day 6 so I'll stop for now and continue trying to organize the boatload of pictures I took.

 

[Tucsontom]

Keep em coming!

 

[kcabpilot]

Day 6 - the Burr Trail

Back up to Hwy 12 and east again to Boulder City where we catch the northern end of the Burr Trail. It's a nice paved road that descends down into deep and narrow Long Canyon, a place that almost rivals Zion without the crowds of tourists.

After the canyon the road continues southeast until the pavement ends where it enters Capitol Reef N.P.

Eventually you come upon a large escarpment called the waterpocket fold where the trail descends a series of steep switchbacks

From there you enter one of those other-world-like areas that seem more like a foreign planet than Earth

The Burr Trail Road continues southeast to Hwy 276 near Bullfrog Bay on Lake Powell but we decided to try a "shortcut" across the south end of the Henry Mountains to Star Springs on the slopes of 11,000 foot high Mt Hillers passing places with names like Tarantula Mesa, No Man Mesa and Ragged Mountain. We had asked about this route at the ranger station in Escalante the day before but they had no information on it's condition. There were long sections where there were no fresh tracks other than those of three Discoveries.

At Star Spring there was a pretty nice campground that was completely deserted. We hadn't seen anyone in fact since coming out of Long Canyon, which I suspect is where most people turn around and head back to Boulder. It was too early to stop however and we had a long ways to go yet to position ourselves for the start of the White Rim trail the next day so we continued on to Hwy 95 where we had a choice of going north to I-70 or south to Hite Crossing, the only two options to get across the Colorado and then Moab. The distance either way was about equal so we opted for the southern route. Either way involved very long stretches of basically nothing. We ended up at a campground called Devils Canyon about halfway between Blanding and Monticello on Hwy 191, about 70 miles from Moab so we were in a good position to start the White Rim the next day.

Bridge at Hite Crossing

So ends Day 6. Tomorrow the White Rim Trail - here's a teaser...

 

[kcabpilot]

Day 7 - White Rim Trail

We broke camp early at Devils Canyon and headed north for Moab where we shopped for some supplies and waited for the Brewery to open so we could have a decent lunch before heading to the Canyonlands ranger station to check in. On the way we fueled up and, for the first time, I filled the jerry cans on the roof rack. I had reservations about bringing them along even though they weigh practically nothing when empty and due to the huge roof top tent behind them they probably don't create any more net aerodynamic drag than if they weren't there. Plus I was also carrying a chainsaw to a place where there are no trees and campfires are not allowed. The White Rim Trail is about 100 miles long and even with the distances to and from the trail heads as well as the side trips of Lathrop Canyon, White Crack and Taylor Canyon it is very unlikely that we would need extra fuel but I figured I'd fill them anyway and just siphon them out after I had used 10 gallons.

Well, when we checked in at the ranger station we were told that due to flooding on the Green River the White Rim was impassable between Labyrinth and Mineral Bottom, which was the far end from where we were but that we could go all the way to the end and return - if we had enough fuel. So the extra tanks were vindicated although I already knew that due to my schedule and the fact that my vacation was ending there was no way we would have enough time to do that. So we had to alter our plans somewhat.

The beginning of the trail is at the bottom of the Shafer switchbacks

The road is pretty decent past the Gooseneck Overlook and up to Muscleman Arch

This is the spot where most of the guided day tours turn around and past Muscleman the road degrades to a trail that considerably slows your pace in many sections. Other sections are decent and you can make good time across the sandy areas but going all the way to the end and back again would require at least three days in my estimation.

When we arrived at the road into Lathrop Canyon there was a thunderstorm passing over so we waited to make sure it didn't rain because it's a pretty steep descent and climb back out that none of us wanted to try in the wet. It's a worthy side trip however and I'd suggest anyone coming out here to do it as some of the rock formations down there are the weirdest I've ever seen.

Due to the flooding of the river we weren't able to make it all the way to the end of the road however.

We drove back out of the canyon and a short distance later arrived at the Airport Campground where we had a campsite reserved for the first night

Our second night was supposed to be at Murphy's Hogback which was twice as far along the trail as we had traveled the first day and from there we would have to travel back along the entire distance so we had to come up with an alternate plan.

 

[mmbirtcher]

Looks like a great trip! Must head that way someday soon!

 

[Toyo4Runner]

seems like a fun trip. awesome photos! :bigok: