Photo credit to Steve “Doom” Fassbinder of Four Corners Guides
Packrafting is just like it sounds— backpacking except you bring along an inflatable boat, and at some point, take to the water. In the fall of 2023 I got my first taste of packrafting on a guided trip with Four Corners Guides. Five spectacular canyon landscapes out of five. Would definitely packraft again with these lovely humans!
The course started with a day of skills training in a whitewater park, which was my first experience with whitewater in any boat, much less a packraft. No pictures from that day… my camera doesn’t belong anywhere near an activity that requires a dry suit!
I learned a few important things. First: I need a lot more practice in paddling. I’m not efficient and burn a lot of energy doing even simple things. Second, I can’t rely on being able to wear contact lenses for waterborne adventures. One eye was sore after this day, so I went back to wearing my glasses. Unfortunately I didn’t have prescription sunglasses with me, and couldn’t layer my sunglasses over glasses, so for the rest of the trip I had to wear my sun hat pulled as far down over my eyes as I could possibly get it to counter the sun and the glare. Not ideal.
The next day we started the expedition, heading into remotest Utah to the Sundance trail that would drop us 1200 feet down into Dark Canyon.
Can you pick out the “trail” that picks its way down that slide? Neither can I. The good news is that the ankle I turned earlier in the summer gave me no trouble even on the steep descent, and yes I did bring my real boots for the hiking portion of the expedition.
Water in the desert always feels special. We camped along a spring-fed stream that created and still runs clear through the canyon. The next day we followed the ripple of clear water between towing canyon walls, in and out of the sun, past unexpected deep pools and shallow sand bars, and over small cascades. As usual, photos do it no justice.
What makes Dark Canyon dark? Nobody is really sure, but I like the theory that it’s named for the layer of darker shale exposed below the red sandstone.
When we reached the confluence with the Colorado River, we inflated our packrafts (which my editing program always wants to autocorrect to packrats), and took to the water. One of the beautiful things about packrafting is that you can store gear safe and dry inside the tubes of your boat. Since I’m a little paranoid about camera and water, I stowed my camera in a dry bag inside another dry bag inside my packraft, so no photos as we paddled down the Colorado until it became the upper reaches of Lake Powell, past the marina at Hite, and across the lake to reach our final campsite.
Not pictured: the towering sandstone cliffs on either side of the river, the Hite crossing bridge, which we paddled under, the high and dry marina at Hite, and the deep and sucking mud we encountered when we paused at the current boat boat launch.
We camped on water-smoothed sandstone slabs that were once flooded behind the Glenn Canyon Dam, and now exposed as Lake Powell has dropped to record low levels.
The evening was warm and still. I decided to forgo my tent and lay out my pad and sleeping bag directly on the slab. The sky was clear and brilliant in the dry desert air so far from city lights. I’d never slept under the sky before, and I hope this will not be the only time I do. (Have I mentioned that one of the things I love about the desert, even so close to the river? No bugs!).
The next morning we hiked overland until we reached the BLM road that would lead us back to our vehicles, and civilization, and real life.
I have a few additional impressionistic memories from this trip:
- Gazing out the airplane window on the short flight between Denver and Durango at the valleys filled with golden aspens
- The feeling of surprise the first time I successfully dug my paddle vertically into the water and felt my packraft pivot around it out of the current
- The temperature difference between October in New England and October in the desert of the Four Corners. It was like stepping back into Summer! I packed all the wrong layers.
- The absolute bliss of showering off layers of sweat, sunscreen, and river mud and emerging with clean hair
- This was a relatively short trip, and I didn’t give myself much adjustment time between work, expedition, and work again. Looking back from 18 months into the future, the memory feels like a dream: vivid and vital and very real in the moment but quickly buried under the sediments of the day to day. I’m glad I have even these few photos to project myself back in time.