•San Juan River Trip: Mexican Hat-Clayhills Crossing
Day 1: We got on the river at about 11:30 and made our way down through the Goosenecks of the San Juan. However before we got there the river showed us who was boss at the first Class II rapid, Gypsum Creek, out of the four canoes, two kayaks, and two duckies only one canoe, one kayak, and the two duckies made it through unscathed. This was quite a wake up call for our little armada. Nobody got hurt though and after bailing our boats and warming up we got back on the river. We floated down through the Goosenecks with steep limestone cliffs forming a serpentine channel for us to follow. We had lunch at the base of one of the Goosenecks where an old stone cabin still remains. We finished up the day at our campsite on river left and enjoyed a fine meal of burritos.
Day 2: Waking up to a glorious day on the river we prepared our boats for the river and got started by 10:30 or so. Only a few riffles today with nothing causing much trouble except for a rock that managed to dump me when I was in one of the kayaks. We were able to find some catfish by the luck of the river and enjoyed them with our dinner of elk and chicken kabobs.
Day 3: The next day turned out to be quite warm, the warmest on the river, as we did not have to bundle ourselves up. We arrived at the top of Ross Rapid by lunchtime and made it through somewhat successfully with only one spilled kayak and one canoe getting wrapped on a rock at the base of Ross. We had lunch at the foot of Ross and continued down to our campsite at the mouth of John's Canyon. Unfortunately the canoe that got bent at Ross Rapids, "Rocking in the Free World" would receive more abuse that night. A wicked windstorm was blowing up canyon and sent the canoe tumbling down the beach. We managed to get all the canoes tied together and they rode out the rest of the storm fine.
Day 4: We awoke to a very cold day and nobody was that enthusiastic about getting on the river. We had to stop a ways down and warm ourselves up with some libations before continuing on to Government Rapids. At low water this is a real nasty rock choked garden with little room to for maneuvering. We decided to portage the canoes and duckies but ran the duckies with no problem. While we portaging another river party with two oar boats attempted to run it, the first one got stuck about 2/3rds through it but managed to scrape through it after about 20 minutes. The next boat made it through about halfway before it got pinned on a rock with its upriver pontoon slowly submerging beneath the roiling river. These yahoos eventually threw off all their gear and partially deflated the pontoon before they could manage to slide off the rock. We continued on down that night to the mouth of Slickhorn Canyon.
Day 5: We only had a few river miles to our next campsite, Grand Gulch. The day was fairly warm and the libations were flowing as we floated down the river. Eventually 2/3rds of the party was engaging in a little naked boating. We made it to Grand Gulch in time for lunch and went exploring up the canyon, which is replete with Native American rock art and archeological sites. Day 6: Unfortunately all good things must come to an end. We had 14 miles to paddle on slack water that is filled with sand bars and mud flats, courtesy of Powel Reservoir. The day was cold and the wind was blowing right from the start. With all the paddling there was not much time to enjoy the scenery, which is spectacular. We finally arrived at the take out spot, Clay Hills Crossing, 58 river miles from where we started. And for the Grand Finale of our trip while we were packing up it started to snow on us. Remember though that a day on a river is better than most anything else you can do.
- Matt Gravett