SNOW CANYON STATE PARK, UT
This week has been slow activity-wise. On Monday, my ropes class was canceled due to rain, and although it had mostly stopped by evening, I chose to stay in over hiking in cold, overcast, intermittently rainy weather. On Wednesday, I had my ropes class and did just a quick easy hike to The Vortex. Tomorrow I'm staying in to pack for The Big Hike on Saturday and go to bed early.
So today, I wanted to get in a good workout.
The difficult hikes I found earlier are at higher elevation, which means snow. Probably LOTS of snow after this rain, which I've learned translates to snow at 10,000 ft.
So I turned to AllTrails and found Diedre Peak, rated hard, 4 stars, just 23 reviews (translation: no people!), located in Snow Canyon State Park. It's a flat easy hike past the Lava Tubes and looks like a nice climb up one of the peaks on the west side of the park with a nice 1,500' elevation gain.
The reviews are all over the place. Here is a smattering of those that were most interesting to me:
From Christopher: Easy hike to the scramble, with class 3 [on a scale of 5] up to the summit. Beautiful views from the top!
From Andrea: there's no trail markings but follow AllTrails and it should be mostly good! Climbing rocks for sure (no rope needed) ...
From Sara: WOW. Absolutely gorgeous. Comparable to angels landing. Rocky climb up. Would not recommend bringing little kids.
My favorite review from David who gets bonus points for using "spicy" as a hiking adjective: Spectacular legit mountaineering scramble up to Deidre Peak! No trail just follow the (sometimes knife-edge!) ridge. Class 3 moves with one Class 4 near the top. 40+mph wind gusts made it extra spicy. Kudos to whoever put this on AllTrails! Absolute blast and totally gorgeous. Take scrambling gloves and know your limits. This was like Angel’s Landing except no chains to hold on to ;)
Other reviews talked about taking their teenagers along. Some lost the trail and turned back half-way. But overall, seemed manageable.
Here we go!
Bur first, a quick word from our geology sponsors. The pic below is a view on the way to Deidre Peak. Sharing not because it's stunning, but because it illustrates what I mentioned in an earlier post: the sand color changes wildly along my hikes. Usually the change is more gradual. Here it is a stark contrast - red on the left, white on the right. Crazy!
Ok, back to the program! Today I tested out my new GoPro Hero9 in preparation for The Big Hike on Saturday. I took video on the way up and way down, and I know it's long, but I think it does a good job of showing just how steep it really is! Also, first GoPro lesson learned: keep your backpack strap out of the frame! :)
Spoiler Alert: I did NOT make it to the top. Not even close. I got to about 400' and had a little chat with myself about no need to panic, you can't fall when you are standing still on a big giant rock, don't let your adrenaline control your mind, it's fine, It. Is. FINE.
Here's where I was standing when I had that little pep talk. Those big bushes in the picture? Not bushes. Full-grown 20-30' trees.
Once I got back to the bottom, I tried to get a picture of how far up I made it. That didn't work out very well because the mountain was in shadow that time of day and I never found a good angle, so this is the best I could get to show how high up I got. Doesn't look that impressive from here, but the part where the rock turns white is about 400' up and is much higher than in looks in this picture!
Overall thoughts on Deirdre Peak
This hike ended up NOT being the good cardio workout I was looking for. Scrambling up and down rocks is slow with a lot of time spent figuring out the best route. Enough that Siri kept asking me if I was done hiking. "No, Siri! Stop being passive aggressive about my slow speed. You KNOW I'm still hiking."
But this hike WAS an adventure! This is the first time I've done a sustained Class 3. This is the longest scramble I've done (about a quarter of a mile up) and on an unmarked trail to boot. And I'm not scared of heights, but this one made the hike equally physical AND mental.
Definitely a fun, challenging, choose-your-own-adventure hike!