The recovery of Rose Backhaus’s body from an eastern Utah canyon Sunday — after being missing for five months — has brought relief to her family and the solace that “she died doing what she loved.”
Backhaus, a 54-year-old copy store manager from Garfield County, was an avid hiker who was scouting out remote trails she intended to explore later on, her sister-in-law Mary Backhaus, said Monday night.
Rose Backhaus was the subject of an intense search when she went missing in a hiking area near Goblin Valley State Park in November.
“We’re relieved to finally have closure, but, still, it’s very difficult,” Mary Backhaus said.
Emery County, Utah, Sheriff Lamar Guymon said Rose Backhaus might have died of exposure after she got lost in the Upper Chute Canyon area. An autopsy will be performed at by the state medical examiner’s office, he said.
Three hikers found her body in a narrow slot canyon Saturday. Law enforcement officials recovered the body Sunday.
Though an experienced hiker and physically fit, Backhaus was not dressed for the cold weather that had moved into eastern Utah at the time she went missing, authorities said.
Originally from Denver, she had lived in New Castle about seven years. She was a manager at Copy Copy in Glenwood Springs.
She is survived by two adult children and three grandchildren. Her son, Michael Backhaus, said Monday evening that he would issue a statement within the next few days.
Funeral arrangements have not yet been made, he said.
She was last seen checking out of the La Quinta Inn in Moab about 8 a.m. Nov. 16. The last call from her cell phone was made at 10:20 a.m. that day.
Her car was found about 120 miles away on Nov. 24 in the Little Wild Horse Canyon parking lot.
Crews searched intensely for Backhaus for about a month after she was reported missing, then intermittently after that, Guymon said.
She left a journal entry in notes in her Ford Explorer saying she had just arrived at the park Nov. 16, a departure from her weekend plan to hike in the Moab area.
Planes, helicopters, dogs, more than 40 officers from Utah law-enforcement agencies, plus friends, family and other volunteers, scoured the canyons in the rugged 3,600-acre park.
Guymon said searchers initially focused on 14 miles of narrow canyons in one direction and 30 miles in another, turning up finding a glove, a Chapstick and a footprint believed to belong to Backhaus.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
Joey Bunch: 303-954-1174 or jbunch@denverpost.com
