After days of scouting, research, curiosity and debate, the edict came like the refrain from a canyoneering hip-hop classic in the making.
“We just need to drop that slot,” former rock-climbing guide Charlie Ebel of Red Cliff announced with rhyming conviction.
The decision ultimately arrived easier than the plan. From the houseboat base camp several miles up the Escalante River arm of a nearly deserted Lake Powell, the mission seemed plausible, but reliable information was impossible to come by. A network of the Southwest’s most dedicated slot canyoneers knew next to nothing about the remote half-mile ravine connecting Clear Creek Canyon to the lake at what’s known as the Cathedral in the Desert. Guide books, websites, GPS and Google Earth imagery offered little more.
The scenario is hardly unusual in the realm of desert canyoneering, in which hidden geologic intricacies peel away like layers of a sandstone onion. Within the Four Corners region of the American West, the labyrinthine web of gor- ges and chasms making up the Escalante River Canyon might constitute an “inside” corner, an almost underground passage easily overlooked in the larger desert picture surrounding what we now call Lake Powell.
Oh, sure, it has long been on the map, in bold typeface since the 1996 designation of the surrounding 1.9 million-acre Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. But near as we know, the river canyon bearing missionary explorer Silvestre Velez de Escalante’s name was never actually discovered on the circuitous route that brought that first party of non-natives through Utah in 1776. And much of it remains relatively hidden.
Modern explorers of the region tend to plod through the canyons the way Escalante himself might have — as out-and-back hikers and backpackers on what have evolved into well-traveled overland routes to the scenic arches and slots of places like Hole-in-the-Rock and Coyote Gulch.
Contorting challenge
And while that’s all well and good for the desert devotees among us, to truly appreciate this vast treasure of adventure lying along the basin’s 1,960-mile shoreline, it’s best to approach the exploration as Maj. John Wesley Powell did nearly 100 years after Escalante and nearly 100 years before this river became a lake — with the assistance of worthy watercraft.
“We didn’t ask them to dam up the Colorado River, but now that it’s done, we might as well enjoy it,” said Ebel’s longtime climbing partner, Tom Chamberlain from Montrose.
At a length of 140 miles (not including the Escalante and San Juan River arms), enjoying an inert body of water the size of Lake Powell fairly demands the use of motorized boats. The Bullfrog (Mile 95, Utah) and Wahweap (Mile 1, Arizona) marinas are supplied with fleets of rental houseboats that serve as luxurious base camps on the lake, some including reserve “toy tanks” to gas up more nimble powerboats used to access remote regions of the lake such as the Escalante.
The real adventures begin from there.
Outfitted with climbing harnesses over neoprene insulation for cold pool plunges into the anticipated potholes, and some 400 feet of rope for a rumored trilogy of rappels, the Ebel-Chamberlain expedition called for an early scout team drop at one of the Escalante’s few landings with nontechnical climbing access while a pair of kayakers shuttled the powerboat to the Clear Creek Canyon mouth.
After a 2-mile desert hike, the groups reunited at the broad entrance to the fissure, where a series of potholes offered brain-teasing and body- contorting challenges as the team of eight adventurers made its way into the narrowing slot.
While the government-built Glen Canyon Dam gets credit for turning the Colorado River into the nation’s second- largest man-made lake (behind Lake Mead, downstream), it’s the river and its tributaries in their original form that lay claim to much of the surrounding artistry. That reality was emphasized in the crux of the Clear Creek Canyon route, where the fissure tapers and contorts before plummeting into a “Silence of the Lambs”-style “keeper” well carved out by aquatic erosion.
Drop worth the anxiety
With some nifty maneuvering and expert rope work, Chamberlain was able to negotiate the chasm, only to find himself staring down at treetops nearly 100 feet below. No less than five aging bolts placed in the cliff wall by previous climbers served as indicative rappel anchors.
“You can always tell how big a rap is by the number of bolts people use,” Chamberlain quipped. “We’re going to need every piece of rope we have for this one.”
As it turned out, the blind drop was just less than 100 feet, about 75 feet free-hanging, offering plenty of opportunity to spark both anxiety and enthusiasm in the largely novice team. But the reward of dropping into the spectacular cathedral was nonpareil.
“My guess is that fewer than 50 people have ever done that route,” Chamberlain said after emerging from the daylong epic.
“That was about as challenging as any slot I’ve ever done,” Ebel added. “A classic.”
The only things missing are a backbeat and a microphone.
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