Part Eighty Five

     December 31st – January 2nd             Gila NF, NM                      (Go to Pt 1)
​
Instead of mountaineering, I was going canyoneering.  When Craig and I had planned this trip to walk the crest of the continent, the last thing I expected was to find myself on a multi-day, canyon trek.  However, I had been gambling with water sources ever since crossing over into New Mexico, so following the Gila River gave me a lifeline free of water worries.

The canyon started like most; a shallow, narrowing valley, sprouting a few rock outcrops before etching deeper into the ground.  There was no trail leading into the canyon and the early going through open, mixed forest was beautiful, feeling both untamed and mysterious

After meandering a few, circuitous miles, I came across an idyllic, little glen just begging for a tent, so I obliged and made camp.  The surroundings were almost magical and New Mexico’s ‘Land of Enchantment’ signature was starting to make real sense.  If there was any chance of seeing a Hobbit, this was likely the place.

Click on the map for a larger image

​All day, dark clouds had laid heavily across the sky but as Radio and I settled-in for supper, the tail end of the stormfront I’d been under for days finally cleared out and stars soon appeared.  The starry skies brought a precipitous, overnight drop in temperatures and silvery frost across the meadow in the morning.  Sun was beginning to find its way down to the canyon floor and the entire scene that greeted me that morning was full of energy and I was stoked to go canyoneering.

Starting out, the canyon floor was still fairly broad with the shallow river running down a rocky riverbed, but as I wandered further into the canyon, side springs began to feed more water into the river, causing an incremental rise with each passing spring, of which there were considerably more than I would have guessed.

Further, the canyon walls began to rise-up as the gorge narrowed, eventually narrowing to where the river’s course began to run up against steep, rocky terrain at many of the bends, and bends in the river were beginning to multiply.

​At these bends, where the river would cut into the canyon walls, I’d be forced into crossing over to gravel bars on the opposite side, and by early afternoon I was making several river crossings per hour.  At this point, the river was still fairly shallow with plenty of exposed rocks for rock-hopping but each rock-hop across the river took time.

As the day wore on, the coils of the river tightened, forcing me into even more river crossings until my patience with the ever increasing rock-hops was starting to run thin, then I got pinched into a spot without enough rocks to hop.  Damnit.  My experience and common sense told me to keep my boots dry and, without question, I had always taken-off my boots and socks for a wet, river crossing.

So, I reluctantly took-off my boots, wet-stepped it across the river, then delt with the foot-drying, boot-tying process only to be confronted ten minutes later with another wet crossing. Damnit!  I pulled off my boots and socks in a huff, splashed over to the other side, rebooted, and went practically nowhere before the same thing happened again.  That’s when I finally said, “Fuck it,” and started hiking in the river - boots, socks, and all.

By the end of the day I was somewhere deep into the Gila River Canyon but, with the 250 map, I had no idea how far into the canyon I was, nor did I have a handle on how many more miles of canyon hiking I had left.  I figured I was at least two more days from getting out, maybe three, I just didn’t know.

The canyon was also starting to give me sensations of claustrophobia; being trapped at the bottom of a long, deep chasm, like I was, felt completely foreign to me, and not particularly comfortable.  Above was only a ribbon of sky, and the shady canyon walls seemed to grow oppressive as the afternoon waned.
​
I found a rocky perch for my camp that was well above the river and while I wasn’t expecting rain, I didn’t want my camp turning into flood debris if it did.  I mean, I didn’t know, maybe it would require a biblical-type rainstorm to dangerously flood the canyon, and I knew the chances of that happening mid-winter were nil to none, nonetheless, setting-up a camp down by the river made me nervous.

Once the tent was up and my gear unpacked, I sat down to remove my sodden boots and socks.  I had an extra pair of dry socks and camp booties to put on but I didn’t know what I was going to do with the soaked footgear.  I figured temperatures would fall below freezing overnight but I wasn’t about to put that soggy mess into my sleeping bag, so the socks and boots sat out all night.  Needless to say, I was not happy with that decision in the morning.

​I only had the one extra pair of dry socks, so those were going back into the pack, and my pathetically frozen socks had to be thawed over the stove before I could then proceed with the fantastically cringe-worthy sensation of putting them on. Then there were my boots, frozen-up stiff as plywood and also requiring thaw time around the stove.  I spent an easy half an hour just putting on my damned shoes and socks.

Frozen footwear aside, the morning was actually quite bright and cheerful.  My position in the canyon caught morning sun and the overnight, river frost had left a shimmering glow around the reeds, stalks, and grasses standing dormant across the river bottom. Shortly after starting out, the canyon widened somewhat to allow decent stretches of meadow hiking away from the river, and it was in these meadows where I began to see traces of a canyon trail.

As I progressed, the trail continued to establish itself until I was satisfied it wasn’t a game trail but rather a bonafide thread leading back out to civilization, which was reassuring.  Around mid-day, as I was merrily wandering along the trail, I was startled to come across a couple camped out in one of the small meadows, and delighted to take a leisurely lunch break at their camp.

I told them a little bit about the trip I was doing but mostly they talked while I listened.  They wanted to know if I had been able to keep up with any current events during my trek and the only thing I knew about current events was that, presumably, Jimmy Carter was still president, after that, nada.
​
Well, two hours later I knew a whole lot more about people I’d never heard of who were creating events for which I had no context and, of course, I had nothing to say about all that.  They kind of reminded me of Radio in that, after a while, I was ready to switch the station.  Just before leaving, I asked how long it had taken them to get there and they told me two days.

As I left the couple’s camp, I noticed my boots were on their way to drying-out since I had managed to stay out of the river all morning, but just as the little stretches of meadows had appeared, so did they disappear when the canyon walls closed-in again, forcing me back into the river.

By late afternoon, the chasm was deeper and narrower than anything I’d been through thus far, and as the towering, canyon walls pressed in from both sides they began to feel sinister and unfriendly.

At this point, I was zig-zagging across the river constantly and running out of time to find a decent campsite.  Unfortunately, I was in a stretch of the canyon where there were nothing more than gravel shoals pushed up against the rock walls.

​I continued splashing down the river until the canyon finally grew dark and there was no longer any choice but to set-up camp on a gravel bar next to the water.  I was fairly certain it wouldn’t rain but being trapped at the bottom of this dark, narrow canyon gave me the creeps.  Maybe I wasn’t cut-out for canyoneering.

---

Go to Part 86

---

The CDTC was founded in 2012 by volunteers and recreationists hoping to provide a unified voice for the CDT. Working hand-in-hand with the U.S. Forest Service and other federal land management agencies, the CDTC is a non-profit partner supporting stewardship of the CDT. The mission of the CDTC is to complete, promote and protect the Continental Divide National Scenic Trail, a world-class national resource. For more information, please visit continentaldividetrail.org.

---