Part 1 - 2023 Spring Western US adventure
Part 2 - 2023 Spring Western US adventure - Nevada, Arizona, Utah
- Animal encounters
- Coyote
- Pronghorn
- Elk
- Rattlesnake
- Black bear
- Yellow belly marmot
Wyoming - Montana
Flaming Gorge
From Dinosaur we headed to Flaming Gorge National Recreation area. As the names sounds, it's very red and it's a huge gorge. The areas elevation is about 7400 feet and covers about 42,000 acres with some beautiful sweeping views. There are plenty of forested areas and quite a bit of wildlife. Spring seemed to be just starting and you could still see the remnants of winters snow melt leaving some of the fields will shallow flooding.
We camped at Red Canyon Campground near the gorge and the Red Canyon Dam. The dam is holding back the Green river that flows to the Colorado. Our unofficial camp host was an adorable Yellow Belly Marmot about 100 feet away from where we camped. she/he had a home under a large flat cut stump that they used as a throne or lookout for part of the day. This adorable rotund little critter was very busy for most of the day. We enjoyed watching it gather mouths full of pine needles to pad an underground nest. At first, I thought it was strange that they decided to live right in the middle of the campground but then we realized that it was an easy trade off to avoid predators that are much more dangerous than a bunch of noisy humans.
Sinks Canyon, Lander Wyoming
A friend loaned us a book for rock climbing in Lander Wyoming so we decided go!
Sinks Canyon near Lander Wyoming sits at about 6,850 feet is, as you would expect for Wyoming, full of hiking, backpacking, mountain bike riding, and etc. The name comes from the Popo Agie river that runs through this canyon (created by a glacier). The river flows into an underground limestone cavern, named "the Sinks," and emerges a quarter-mile down the canyon in a pool named "the Rise." This was confirmed by adding dye to the water and waiting for it to come out at the other end. The dye was expected to take only a few minutes to show up at the rise but it actually took over two hours. It's unknown exactly why the water takes so long. Another interesting observation by researchers was that more water goes into the tunnel than comes out, but they don’t know where the other water goes...yet.
The landscape is interesting in that the glacier that carved this area left boulders large and small, strewn all of the hillsides of the area. The glacier also carved out the steep cliffs that now make up an excellent climbing area.
Rock Climbing Notes: Sinks Canyon area is also very well known for climbing. I’m told that there is a yearly international climbing event here in July. The climbs are on a series of cliff faces that require a steep approach up to the base of the climbs. Once up, there is a decently good trail that will take you to any climb you desire and there are over 300, mostly sport climbs rating from 5.6 to 5.14c (I did not notice anyone doing trad climbing in this area, but it's seems perfect for trad). I hiked up to scope out some climbs for us and was lucky enough to see some guys doing some of the 5.12+ climbs on an area called Moss Cave. The easiest climb on this “bulge” is a 5.12d. Very impressive to watch.
What’s interesting about the climbs here is: 1. All of the harder climbs are well bolted with quickdraws already attached. 2. The bolts seem very close together on all the climbs (no complaints from me). 3 I didn’t notice many multi-pitch climbs. 4. This place is finger pocket city (finger tendons beware).
Craig and I found some EASY 5.6-5.7 climbs on a wall called “More Fundy Than Junky”. Most of the climbs were no more than 35 meters but my favorite climb was a long route named “Zozo’s Dance” (FA Lightners 2015) that required a 60 meter rope and nine quickdraws.
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