15.5 miles, 10.5 hours

Some of the rugged Escalante Trail today was right along the edge of very tall walls above the river. The trail is cairned in places and can branch off, but it seemed easy enough to follow, though the going was still pretty slow. There are many varieties of cacti blooming in the Canyon, adding color to the red stone and green brush color pallette. Much of the trail is above the river here, so we only were able to cool off a couple of times in the Colorado at the mouths of side canyons.

TRAIL NOTES:
The Beamer and Escalante trails are very rugged and slow going–just don’t expect them to be like the more popular trails in the Grand Canyon. In addition to what the book says, there is also easy river access at mile 36.9 at the mouth of the Escalante River. There was no water from mile 39.7 until Hance Creek at 45.4, which was a good trickle.

Concerning all Grand Canyon mileage: when we compared the mileage in the book to the Grand Canyon trail descriptions that came with our permit, the actual mileage is 10-25% more than what the book says. This may be true for many of the actual trail sections of the Hayduke (as opposed to wash-bottom sections or other parts that don’t tend to have switchbacks). Just be prepared for additional rugged mileage on top of what is in the book.