UT Outdoors 

Time for another big day. Today we hit Aardvark, a canyon I had only heard rumors about. It rarely gets done because of the nightmare logistics and length of the day. We got lucky and for Matt's birthday Mother Nature made the logistics easier but it was still a big day with questionable weather. The photo's however turned out better than I expected so here they are.

Matt adding his personality to yet another photo.

From Aardvark Canyon

Land of domes.

From Aardvark Canyon

Good light on wet slickrock (it definitely rained out here the night before).

From Aardvark Canyon

Cool little arch.

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

She's smiling because it hasn't goten cold yet ;)

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

Matt holding a stick on his birthday.

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

Matt waving on his birthday.

From Aardvark Canyon

From Aardvark Canyon

My other favorite shot of the trip.

From Aardvark Canyon

After being in the canyon all day, we approached the final rappel... it was basically a wind tunnel. We were all wet and cold already, the wind tunnel did not help at all. Here, Jenny and Ram are huddling out of the wind while we get the ropes set and start quickly sending people down. No photos of the last rap because I was busy helping get people out.

From Aardvark Canyon

After our hike into Phipps Wash we drove into town for an early dinner then drove out to meet Ram and his crew. Along for the trip were Ram, Aaron, Doc, Matt, Jenny, and Me. Jenny was no ordinary canyoneer though. She was the girlfriend of one of the pioneers of the sport and was on many first descents in the 70's and 80's in some ultra classics that get done all the time today. She brought her laptop and showed us old scanned slides from places like Choprock, Baker, Poe, Happy Dog, etc... Her endless energy and love for the desert was contagious. With her and Matt along we were all fully entertained and a few times bent over laughing until our abs were sore!

On the agenda for today was a canyon we named Sad Cow Disease. Bill Wolverton and Steve Cole had descended it and we had some sparse beta from them but mostly we were just exploring. It turned out to be a short but really nice, really photogenic slot. We climbed, squoze, rap'ed, and shimmied our way down. Shortly before the end we started to get a whiff of something nasty. I was in the lead and hesitated to move forward. As we kept moving the smell got stronger... something ahead of us was dead and rotting.

Sure enough, Matt caught a glimpse of what it was. A big dead cow in the middle of the slot. With my face inside my shirt, I basically ran toward it, stemmed over it, and kept running to get away from the smell. But mom wasn't the only one who died, behind her was the corpse of her calf, who stuck with her till the end. We were all pretty traumatized by the smell but Jenny was a bit traumatized by the scene of mother and baby, thus the name of the canyon.

Looking for a way up.

From Sad Cow Disease

From Sad Cow Disease

From Sad Cow Disease

After a lot of searching for access, we find a rappel.

From Sad Cow Disease

From Sad Cow Disease

From Sad Cow Disease

Matt decided to try and wave in as many pictures as he possibly could... Hello Matt.

From Sad Cow Disease

From Sad Cow Disease

From Sad Cow Disease

The light in the slot was phenomenal.

From Sad Cow Disease

Probably my favorite shot of the trip.

From Sad Cow Disease

From Sad Cow Disease

Really cool crawl through tunnel-like spot.

From Sad Cow Disease

From Sad Cow Disease

From Sad Cow Disease

From Sad Cow Disease

The cow smelled way too bad, I didn't stop to take pictures of it, so here is the hike out.

From Sad Cow Disease

From Sad Cow Disease

From Sad Cow Disease

Oh ya, and weather turned bad. We barely made it to the cars before the rains came... and didn't stop for hours.

From Sad Cow Disease

Jason had been training for a marathon but not the full body workout that is Canyoneering so before meeting up with the big crew we opted for a mellow hike. The original plan was to hike down into Death Hollow and check out the lower section but high winds and cold temps made us pick something that didn't involve wading through a river. I looked through my guidebooks but couldn't find anything that didn't involve a ton of driving, then I found a route description for Phipps Wash on Tom Jones' Website. Perfect! Here is a link to Tom's description:

http://canyoneeringusa.com/utah/esca/phipps.htm

And here are some pictures from our hike:

From Phipps Wash

From Phipps Wash

From Phipps Wash

From Phipps Wash

A really funky tree.

From Phipps Wash

The riparian section with lots of sun.

From Phipps Wash

From Phipps Wash

From Phipps Wash

From Phipps Wash

From Phipps Wash

From Phipps Wash

From Phipps Wash

Tons of swirls on the hike.

From Phipps Wash

From Phipps Wash