South Coyote Buttes and White Pocket

August 8

Cottonwood Cove - South Coyote Buttes

Click here for today's pics.

Our description and pictures just won't do today's adventure to see South Coyote Buttes (SCB) and White Pocket justice.  We started our day with a pickup by Dreamland Safari Tour Guide "Don" at 8am in his Suburban.  With coveted permit pass in hand (they only allow 20 people in per day to see SCB and we got ours in online lottery 4 months ago), we drove 40 minutes on highway 89, then 20 minutes on unpaved House Rock Valley Road and then another 60+ minutes on dirt/sand road.  Don let some air out of the tires for this.  That sand road was the cause for our signing up for a "tour" as opposed to heading off on our own.  The dirt road was crazy!  Slow going, deep ruts, steep, slippery sand.  Oh, and no signs.  Would have been very difficult (impossible?) to get their on our own.  Totally lucked out with weather - started out in low 70's(!) and beautiful blue skies no chance of rain.

We parked and hiked to SCB - short, easy 20 minute hike though orange sand.  The kids loved picking the sand up and letting it run through their hands.  

The area of SCB was simply breathtaking.  It's hard to know what thing made it the neatest - the colors, the striations in the rocks, the fact that these rock structures even exist in the middle of this vast expanse of valley/desert.  The whole thing is so untouched by the outside world - no evidence of anyone having been there.  Just incredible.  Once we reached the big rocks, there was no "trail" anymore.  You just walk around, up and over rocks seeing impressive view after impressive view.  The kids loved scrambling all around exploring, some of it was quite steep and a little slippery with the flaking sandstone.  Just had to be careful of areas with fragile layers in the rock exposed where you don't want to break it and increase the rate at which it is weathering.  The colors are caused by variations in the minerals in the rocks.  Where it is redder, there is more iron.  Where it is whiter, there is simply an absence of minerals in the rock.  

The kids also loved finding lizards.  Those poor lizards usually have the whole area to themselves - they didn't even know what hit them.

When we were done exploring (about 2 hours), we headed back out to the truck and made our picnic lunch.  Quick little tailgate in the middle of nowhere.  We then headed out at 1:30 for White Pocket.  Temps were still on our side, maybe low 80's with a nice breeze and some cumulus clouds building off in the distance.   

White Pocket ("whoa!")

The dirt road was again difficult to navigate and it took us an hour to get to White Pocket.  Much of the time we were driving 10 miles per hour.  Again, we were amazed at what we found after a very short (5 minute) hike from where we parked the truck.  White Pocket was quite different from South Coyote Buttes - mostly in the grey "brain"-like rock that covers much of the area rock.  Not only is it unusual looking, but it is cracked in a pattern of geometric shapes.  In addition to that type of rock, we found more of the sandstone rock, with brilliant colors in the afternoon sun and puffy clouds.  The wavy stripes throughout and layered look to the rock are just awesome.  The kids scrambled for another hour and were equally impressed by the White Pocket area.  It was great to watch them scramble up a steep hill of rock, only to lookout over the edge and exclaim "Whoa!" one after the other as they got the next view of cool stuff.  They took picture after picture after picture.  We must have come close to 400 pictures between all the cameras!

We left White Pocket at about 4pm and had a long drive out - again sand road till we connected again to House Rock Valley Road - unpaved and finally onto 89a - Tom having planned our day to be somewhat of a loop to keep things on the drive a little more interesting.

Two notables on the way home.  First, we stopped for a scenic view out over House Rock Valley - beautiful scene of where the Vermillion Cliffs end and the valley begins.  Next, we got very close to a large (currently 280 acres) wildfire on the way home.  We could see and smell the smoke long before we saw it.  Crews were there working to contain it, but it was pretty amazing to see this wildfire up close and in action.  Most of the fire is just brush height, but not 20 feet from the road we saw an entire pine tree being consumed by the flames.  Just amazing, but we were not stopping and Scott couldn't get the shot, so no picture.  

Got home and went to dinner at Charlie's Sports Bar for Callie's burger.  She seemed satisfied, but it was just a greasy burger joint with nice staff.

All in all a fantastic day.  The kids are worried that it's the coolest thing we'll see all trip and they've seen it already on day 2.  We'll see!

Quote of the Day

Guy Scott spoke with who was setting out to hike to The Wave. European, ESL, getting in one last smoke before heading out: "We have one galoon each (of water)."  We knew what he meant.

White Pocket