White Rim

I've been planning to ride the White Rim trail for about 16 years. In 1993, shortly after returning from Japan, a friend of mine mentioned she had ridden it over a 3 day period as part of an outdoors leadership class. When she described it at the time, I thought it sounded barely possible as a one-day trip, and I had never heard of anyone doing it. The web was just taking off and there were very few cycling related sites, and I was not in the cycling community at all, so I did not know what was popular, etc.

For the uninitiated, the White Rim is a jeep road in Canyonlands National Park that winds around the Island in the Sky. The round-trip loop is just over 100 miles, with a few miles of pavement outside the park entrance.

Since that time in 1993, I have come to realize that White Rim In A Day for mountain bikers is kind of like LOTOJA for casual roadies - people seem to think that if you are serious you must have done it, as if it is some kind of holy grail of the sport, but somehow I have managed to miss out on doing it for all these years. Finally this year Reed decided he really wanted to do it, and Adam planned an unorganized, unsupported ride (people are calling it the RAWROD, why you can guess for yourself), and I guess my chance had come.

Reed and I drove down Friday night and camped right above a big set of switch-backs on Mineral Road (which was the Horsethief trail). This led to some confusion because there was a campground named Horsethief or Mineral Bottom (do not remember which) right about 100 yards before the road we wanted, so we pulled into it and drove through the campground, then onto a dirt road, which we assumed to be the road. We were looking at this map that the park service provides, but it is a bit old and sparse. The road had been traveled enough and seemed to be going in the right direction, so we thought we were in good shape for quite a while, but it got more and more rugged and it was slow-going in the Chevy Astro. Reed tried to check his GPS, but couldn't find the course he thought he had loaded onto it. Finally we reached a dead-end where the only path forward required more vehicle capability than we had. We got lightly high-centered on a rock ledge and I couldn't back up off it. It was dark and now I know why off-roaders like those light way up high on the roof.

So I drove down the down, maneuvered a 3 point turn, and fortunately made it back up. By now we figured we absolutely must be on the wrong road and started back for the highway. While picking our way back, Reed figured out the GPS, and it confirmed we were running parallel to, but about two miles away from the correct road. When we found the correct road it was obvious because it was huge, smooth, and graded (easily traversable in any car). We parked the van and went to sleep in the back.

There were quite a few cars in the campground when we awoke:

We had planned to get up and five in ride in the dark for an hour, but our night had gone later than hoped and when I awoke it was light and I knew we had over-slept. We quickly prepared, I downed 4 pouches of instant oatmeal, and we were off.

Three minutes later Reed asked if I had my five dollars to get in the park. I did not, so it was back to the car and then off again.

Here is the profile of the ride:

As you can see, we started with the biggest climb of the day, but it was all on smooth dirt road and pavement. Additionally, the mileage is so high that even when a climb looks big on the profile map, the grades were generally low. In fact, during the long climb in the middle, we were half way up it and I was wondering when we were going to start climbing. It wasn't until I switched the GPS to the elevation profile screen that I realized we had been climbing for some time.

Anyway, starting on the smooth climb was nice because we were carrying all our water for the day at that point, and I had a lot of water. I do not think there is potable water anywhere in the area (the Green might be pumpable), so in my camelbak I had the 70 oz reservoir plus another 70 oz water bag and a 24 oz bottle. On my bike I had two 24 oz bottles and one 20 oz bottle, for a total of 208 oz (13 lbs). Part of the reason we wanted to start early was to ride in the cool morning and lessen the riding in the late day heat, but we were lucky and clouds partially hid the sun for much of the day. If it was a normal, hot day, water would have been tight, but as it was I finished with about 50 oz left over. We especially enjoyed the beautiful morning with lots of blue sky between the scattered clouds.

The first big climb ends at the entrance to the park. We payed our five dollars each and descended the Shafer switchbacks.

The problem with all of the pictures I'll post is they totally miss the grandeur of the area. The sky wraps around you in a way photos cannot capture. The vividness of the colors, the depth of the horizon, and scale of the rocks is totally lost in a photo, especially those taken with a cheap walmart digital camera. I'll post a few anyway, but the only way to understand it to go there yourself.

We hit the half-way mark in four hours. We were making good time and I was starting to get into the groove.

We stopped at an out house half way around. They have out houses equipped with TP every 20 miles or so, which is nice since technically you would be required to pack it all out with you if they did not. So that is what you get for your five-dollars entry...

Much of Utah is 'owned' by the federal government - I've heard 70 percent. When you tour around it is easy to understand why. It isn't because we have lots of oil, coal, uranium, etc. It is because the beauty is so amazing and unique.

The Uintas, the Wasatch, Canyonlands, Bryce, Zions, etc. etc. All amazing.

By about mile 65 or 70, Reeds stomach was starting to rebell, and our pace started slowing significantly. I ride on an all liquid diet, and admit I was jealous of Reed's chocolate covered granola bars early on, but I felt good all day and the envy passed when I could still drink at hour eight.

The afternoon brought more heat for a while, but then it cooled again and started threatening to rain.

We never did get more than a few drops, and the cooler air was nice, especially for Reed who had less water than I did, and didn't feel up to drinking much anyway.

At this point we thought we were starting up the final climb, and I was looking for Jawas, sand people, and R2, but we were wrong on all counts.

We were surprised to see almost no one for the last 30 or 40 miles. Nearer the mid-point we had seen several groups that looked to be on supported, multi-day excursions, and at the beginning we passed several people, but then that was it. We never saw the Epic-Riding group all day, probably saw 4 or 5 motorcycles all day, and about 3 or 4 jeeps that were not supporting bicycles.

On the whole, the riding was less interesting than the scenery, but on nice thing about the direction we rode was the riding was most interesting near the end of the loop because the trail went was right against the mesa rather than out in the middle of the desert. We rolled along parallel to the Green river, and at last the final set of switchbacks arrived:

They were a fun way to end a great ride.