Maple Canyon

As I sit here with a pounding headache, wicked cough, and a throat that feels like it is lined with sand paper my thoughts seem stuck on a moment Friday night.  All bundled up in my mummy bag, hand warmers shoved at the bottom.  My backpacking partner and best friend for almost 10 years, Zach, are sharing a warm freeze dried meal right before going to sleep.  (figured nothing better than hot food in the belly on a sub zero night).  Not wanting to do dishes later we decide to eat out of the food bag itself.  Zach is fine with it but warns he has a cold.  I say thats fine, I mean whats a little cold, nothing my immune system teamed with some over the counter meds can't handle, right?
Well here I am, five days later, getting ready to call into work, sick.  Wondering how I am going to tell the story of our winter camping weekend in Maple Canyon, Utah.

View of road from parking area.

Like most of our trips, this one had been planned for a few months.  We picked Maple Canyon because it was close to Zach's home, about an hour away, and still secluded enough.  Plus being winter we knew there would be little traffic.  In the warmer months Maple Canyon is active, with dozens of people visiting on the weekends.  It happens to have world class and world famous rock climbing.
We both have packed our backpacks with the essentials, not too concerned with room.  Winter gear always takes up more space.  Deciding to pull a sled with some of the gear and fire wood up the snow covered road allowed us the ability to pack our backpacks a little lighter.  I had purchased some fire wood in SLC and Zach still had some old cedar fence posts, that toppled n a wind storm, that he needed to get rid of.  As we were unloading the back of the truck to head up the road we realized the sled wasn't going to cut it and we ended up using the tote bin I had in bed of the pick up as well.

Snowshoes in powder

The snow was perfect.  I have never seen powder like that in my life.  Approximately three feet of pure powder. Even with snowshoes on I was sinking to my shins.  Were lucky to have some old snow mobile tracks to walk in.  Very soon we realized that pulling all our wood and gear in the sled and tote was going to be a little difficult with packs on.  The wood was too top heavy.  About a quarter of a mile up our route we ditched the wood with the tote.  I continued to pull the sled with some of the gear we didn't want to leave alone, in case someone came along.
Once we set up camp we went back to the wood and pulled it up the road.  Again it was top heavy, I'm sure we tried to pull it 15 different ways before we found something that kept us from having to stop every ten yards to pick up toppled pieces.  Even though the road is only about a mile long to the camp ground it was exhausting.  I know I am out of shape, but this was extra hard.  Maybe it was the cold crisp air in the lungs or just the fact that I don't usually pull piles of wood around.
Now I know some of you are thinking we are stupid and a little bit girlish for even wanting a fire, but how many of you have slept outside in January lately?  Thats what I thought.  Once we had a fire going things were just fine.  We roasted brats and Zach practiced roasting apples, which looked like it worked pretty well.  We boiled water on our stoves for warmth.  The nice thing about pulling gear was we had extra room for snacks like crackers and cookies.  We didn't suffer, that is for sure.

Huddled in the tent

It was around 8:30pm when we got settled in the tent.  We boiled more water for the freeze dried meal.  Zach read some bear attack stories from a book he had read, although horrible stories, the author made them seem humorous.  Lucky for us no bears in Maple Canyon.  (had my pistol just in case, since bear spray doesn't work so well in the cold)  Then we dozed off, I knew come 2-3:00am it was going to be cold, I had my beanie and gloves on in my mummy bag.
In the morning we started packing up before heading out.  I actually didn't wake up until about 8:00am, which is kind of late for me when in camping mode.  Normally the sun hits your tent and you are up by 6:00.  Being in a canyon must have helped.

Ice Climber

When packing there was a small group of ice climbers that came up the road on a snow machine.  We thought it would be cool to watch them and we followed their tracks through the small aspen grove into the south fork of the canyon where they had found a frozen water fall to climb.

Center of Utah marker.

It was early afternoon before we were all cleaned up and ready to head out.  We loaded the tote and sled with gear (much lighter with no wood) and made our way down the road back to the truck.  With a quick stop to into box canyon for some pictures, we were on our way.  Moving down the slopped road was much easier with no wood in my bin and less weight on my back.  Once at the truck I had to dig out the two wheels that were in the snow off the side of the road and we loaded up and were off.  We made a quick detour to Mt. Pleasant, location of the geographical center of Utah.  It was one of those 60 second take a picture, veni vidi vici, and leave sort of deals.  Then we headed back to Provo, via Nephi where we got some burgers for lunch.