Slickrock Nirvana - Part Two

Images of sensational slickrock journeys in southwestern Utah.

Related posts:
Slickrock Nirvana:  Part One
​Utah's Red Rock Country
Death Hollow via Boulder Mail Trail - Grand Staircase/Escalante NM
In Search of the Rattlesnake Petroglyph
​White Domes via Water Canyon - Canaan Mountain Wilderness
​Southern Utah Hikes 

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We've made a refreshing change in our mode of hiking and exploring.  After years of using established trails, we are doing more hikes "cross-country" over slickrock or remote desert, where markers are few or none.  We've been fortunate to hike with a fellow southern Utah explorer who has discovered the routes illustrated in the slickrock slideshows below.
​I still appreciate rock cairn markers over miles-long treks in slickrock seas, like Boulder Mail Trail to Death Hollow in Grand Staircase-Escalante.  And, as the southwestern deserts heat up, we will find ourselves in higher elevations on signed forest trails.

Navigation through slickrock country is a fun way to explore, but extra precautions are needed.  You can use dead-reckoning and a compass to travel, but using a topo map helps you discover the canyons and plateaus between you and your destination.  I've started using Topo Maps US, an iphone and ipad compatible navigation application (version 12.0 or later).  With this app, you can download maps for areas in which you will be hiking, record and save your tracks.  I also always use my Garmin GPS to record our tracks, and occasionally Avenza Maps.

​Don't Walk on the Crypto! (more info at end of this post).

Variety, surprise and beauty are paramount in slickrock country.   Uplift, weathering and erosion have shaped an ancient sand sea into countless waterpockets, cliffs, mesas, deeply incised canyons, and arches.  The mineral iron with its resultant iron oxides is king in this landscape, because it creates the beautiful variations of reds, yellows, and oranges (Utah's Red Rock Country).   Pinyon pines and prickly pear cacti grow in sparse, dry and rocky soil, or cling to cliffs.  Its elements - reds and greens, stacked cross beds, rough bark, the sound of wind through pine needles, deep shadows and the sun's glow on its towers create a magical landscape.  

As in Slickrock Nirvana - Part One, the following slideshows contain images from our unique excursions.  More images follow the slideshows.

“Instructions for living a life.
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.”
― Mary Oliver

Yant Flat and areas around St. George, Utah

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Red Mountain Wilderness

Snow Canyon State Park - basalt flows, Navajo Sandstone, and snow-covered Beaver Dam Mountains (limestone).

For more on petroglyphs:  In Search of the Rattlesnake Petroglyph

​Don't Walk on the Crypto!
A subscriber to my posts asked a great question:  "I wonder if you worry about the cryptobiotic crusts?"  
We had to dodge and maneuver around these amazing stabilizing soil crusts to avoid stepping on them.  They're an important part of the ecology in desert ecosystems, and take many years to rebuild if destroyed.

Cryptobiotic (biological) Soil Crusts

Cryptobiotic (biological) soil crusts, made of cyanobacteria, lichens and mosses.  These form on easily eroded soils and increase stability and help provide more water infiltration and are the dominant source of nitrogen in pinyon-juniper ecosystems.  These crusts hold the soil in place.  Recovery of crusts that have been destroyed takes at least 45 years.

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References
Loope, D.  et al. 2016.  Sandstones and Utah’s canyon country: Deposition, diagenesis, exhumation, and landscape evolution​.  University of Nebraska - Lincoln.