This is an awesome trip
27ish mile loop down into a gorge, and follow the river through some epic terrain and back out again. Nick and Matt first attempted this hike in 2007 but went halfway then turned back. Then Matt and I tried it May 2012 but I rolled my ankle 7 miles in and we had to turn back.
This time we finally made it. And it was worth it. Though it would have been nice to have done it the other times as well.
The first stretch is about 6 miles. At that point you start to drop into the gorge. We camped at a small river, about a mile before it met up with a bigger river and the boulder hopping began.
We had started hiking around 7 and got to our campsite late afternoon. The sites are easy to miss. This was the most defined, it even had a fire ring (kind of).
The next day we were headed down deeper into the gorge.
This was our first of three water crossings. I went out to check the depth, we brought inner tubes to float our backpacks down for the deeper crossings. This one did not need it.
We set up our second camp under these cliffs. The map said that there was a campsite near by but it was getting dark and we hadn’t found it. We ended up setting up on a sandy beach. The other site probably washed away when the river rose up.
We had finally made it through the gorge and were on our way out. The last part had been slow hoping over boulders and pushing through swamps but now the gorge was opening up. We had some epic views and a long climb out.
The sun was starting to set as we made it out the canyon. The trailhead ended about 3 – 4 miles from where we had parked our car. Luckily a guy who worked on one of the oil rigs in the area gave us a ride in the back of his pickup. We made it back and got out alive.