Hey Riverman (or others), have you ever hiked up from Grand Gulch camp to see the Anasazi ruins? How far was it, were the dwellings closest to the river worth seeing, and how many days did you spend doing it?
We camped at the creek mouth (right side) above Grand Gulch, I forgot its name, and again at Moonlight, because we heard they were better. One of my favorite camps was at the stranded meander, but most people don't like that one.
"Richard Ferguson" <fergusonOMITsculpture@omitthisatt.net> wrote in message news:nnwUd.295880$w62.265648@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...> Thanks for all the tips, I forwarded them to the team members. I will> try to post a trip report. The trip is shaping up as 6 people, three> canoes and one cataraft. It is kind of a mixed bag of people, no real> novices, but a broad range of experience. I usually run whitewater> solo, so will need to rethink a bit to run it tandem.>
I will bring my wet suit, and I am trying to talk my canoe partner, with> limited paddle experience, into buying a wet suit as well. I figure the> water to be seriously cold, and the air temperature may not be much> better in early April.>
I am not sure what the San Juan flow is likely to be, but in 1993, the> last big snow year, the April flow averaged 6000 cfs. It could be huge> in June, but that does not affect us. One of the trip members has made> the run a half dozen times, but never above 4000 cfs. No one else has> run it before.>
Richard>
When is your trip? April? Hmm, you might not want to continuously wear a wetsuit, as you probably wont swim, and the daytime air temps should be in the 70s, IIRC. Even if the water is snowmelt, I think the water temps will still be in the high 40s, minimum.
BTW, in the past week, flows have dropped from 6000cfs to 1000cfs. That usually means a huge drop in temps upstream, locking up the meltoff. But if it was flowing 6K last week, a lot of runoff has run off. I bet you don't have any more than 4000 for your trip in April.
"Bill Tuthill" <can@spam.co> wrote in message news:4223845a@news.meer.net...> Hey Riverman (or others), have you ever hiked up from Grand Gulch camp> to see the Anasazi ruins? How far was it, were the dwellings closest to> the river worth seeing, and how many days did you spend doing it?>
We camped at the creek mouth (right side) above Grand Gulch, I forgot> its name, and again at Moonlight, because we heard they were better.> One of my favorite camps was at the stranded meander, but most people> don't like that one.>
The lowest camps in Grand Gulch are a day hike in, maybe 4 miles up. I never did the overnight up to the clusters of hut, as I lived in Flag and we had Anasazi riuns all over, so the hot dry hike up GG never appealed to me.
The Perched Meander camp is one of my favorites, too! I like that you can go on this hiking journey and end up back where you started without having to retrace. The canyon above Grand is Slickhorn....did you ever hike up to the pools there? Or the very best pool on the river, at John's canyon?
