White Rim Log – Day 01 Friday, May 9th: Michael and I started off the morning with a quick coffee and breakfast before driving down from Salt Lake City to meet up with Kevin and Brain. Both of them drove out from California to Denver the previous night.
Around noon, we all met in Moab to grab our food at the store and back our bikes before setting off toward Canyonlands National Park. We parked the truck about a mile away from the entrance to Shafer Canyon, made a final stop at the island in the sky overlook, and set off.
All of us were familiar with the White Rim trail - heard stories through friends, seen photos here and there, but if I were being honest, we didn’t really know what was ahead of us.
Shafer Canyon:: An incredible 1000ft+ cathedral of loose, steep switchbacks.
We entered the White Rim trail around 3 p.m. on Friday. The road was carved into tall sandstone cliffs 1000ft below to the valley floor. We kept stopping, trying to capture the magnitude of the landscape. As we descended the switchbacks. The trail got rougher with expanding sections of loose rock.
Airport Tower – Mile 15: After a couple hours of climbing at an unexpectedly slow pace, we arrived at Airport Tower—the halfway point of our day.
By this point, we all realized how rough the remaining 80-ish miles was going to be. Around mile 23, it was getting late—and we all were slowing down from the hot sun and beating. We were taking on the variable desert terrain. Kevin began to fall behind and started to express his exhaustion both verbally and physically.
Together we pushed to mile 30 and had to call it a day there. We were pretty worried that we would decline through the night. At that point, the risk of heat stroke was real. We decided if morning came and he wasn't better, we would turn back
May 10th, Day 02: All of us needed rest, but morning did not come quick. My pad had popped somewhere on day 1 and the hard ground was not forgiving. We all woke up with the sun around 7am, hoping the 2nd day wouldn’t be a rescue mission.
Kevin miraculously made a damn fine recovery and had high spirits once again. We ‘made’ our breakfast, mostly consisting of tuna, rice bars, and a shared cup of the finest coffee thanks to Brian. After packing up camp, we set off for day two, hoping to pedal at least 40 miles and finish the day with our first and last water refill in the Green River.
We had climbed less than 1000ft the first day, so we knew day 2 was going to have a significant amount of vert to climb. The first 10 miles of the day went much smoother than expected. Fairly easy riding, with that exception of the eroded slickrock that constantly rattles you to the core.
Murphy’s Hogback, Mile 17: Around noon, we laid our eyes on one of the major climbs of the trip—Murphy’s Hogback. This section is only 1.5 miles but gains 600 feet on chunky rock with zero cover from the dry, hot sun beating down on us like lizards in a sandstone oven. We all gave a solid effort to pedal up the climb but quickly were geared out and had to push our 50-pound bikes to the top.
At the top, we were met with our first glimpse of the Green River far on the horizon. A shadow formed by a large slab of overhanging sandstone. Our only sliver of shade for the next several hours. We all agreed to stop here for lunch and a much-needed rest. After a long rest and a few bites of summer sausage, we got back to it—knowing we still had a long way to go on the day.
Hardscrabble Hill: Mile 35: We all were getting tired from the brutal and rugged trail, in the heat. Underfueled, dehydrated, and constantly changing mental state. Looking ahead we wondered to that jagged seemingly endless line cut across the cliffs ahead was our route As we pedaled closer, we all knew—that was likely our path. After riding as far up the winding climb as our legs could spin the cranks, we all had to push bikes again up ~25% rock and sand.
We were all becoming very familiar with the ol hike-a-bike in cycling shoes. After reaching the crest of Hardscrabble Hill, we got a spectacular view of the river and where we would be calling home for the night. Only issue— it was still 4 miles and a very technical descent away. We all pedaled slowly together along the steep cliffside, partially taking in the views and recovering
After a grueling fight to locate river access and a reasonable place to camp we found our spot. Micharel set up his sleeping bag on the dirt and went straight to sleep in hopes to recover for the final day I introduced myself to some other folks on the trail and scored a 2% IPS… enough to do the job on a nearly empty stomach. We scarfed down some more tuna and rice and got some rest.
