Death Valley 2022/23

[Beardilocks]

Looks like a great hike. How long did this take you with all the scrambling?

Umm…. Checking my log… 2:07:04sec.  3.75mi total. At a very relaxed pace, poking around some side canyons etc. Finding the best way over the final problem was the only time consuming climb.  And mostly because I was alone.

[jkpaulsen]

Very exact. Thanks! I've got list of short, long, and really long hikes, and was curious where to slot this in mentally.

[MojaveGeek]

Cool one. Ironically, I have a window open to Caltopo and that canyon is on it Making some plans for the north road myself, and there's a couple of not too long canyons in there to check out.

BTW, if anyone is out there looking for something easy and scenic, if the lower (two way) part of Titus is open, but the one way part is not, it's a pretty nice canyon to walk up. Especially in wet conditions, because 1) you're out of the wind and 2) the black and white breccia is just stunning when wet.

[Beardilocks]

About time for another adventure, right?  Brice has been trying to hit all the major and most of the minor Natural Bridges in the park.  On top of all top 200 peaks.  Depending on whose school you subscribe to as far as what counts as a "major" bridge there's somewhere btw ~17-25 in the park.  Today we would make a go for Tucki Bridge.  Some say (Top Gear voice) its the hardest bridge to get to in Death Valley.  Or um... the hardest to get to without rappelling anyway. That's been discovered yet.  

It's a pretty brutal hike with a relatively short window.  Depending on the route you take it will be ~15-20mi round trip with the first 6-7mi being across the salt pan.  So between hot summer temps and short winter days, this hike is only feasible during a short time of the year.  Although walking across the salt pan the dark with a full moon would be epic...

Anyway, with Salt Creek Rd being closed from the flooding this year, we had a bit of a long walk from 190.  We started near Jean Lemoigne's grave and started walking Southwest.

Pretty quickly we came across a section of the boardwalk that was recently washed down from Salt Creek.  Odd to see something like this and think that just about everyone reading this has probably walked down this exact bit of wood, now forever forsaken as a desert relic.  Gives some humanity to the other historic flotsam you walk past out here.  


It was an absolutely perfect day to walk across the salt pan.  Mid-60's and a high haze with no wind.  But pick your path carefully.  Parts of the salt pan can be difficult to walk through with a mini devil's golf course like surface and parts deeply cut from water flow.  We even found some mud still out there.


We came across some incredible features left behind from the floods this past summer like these awesome ripples.


With these traces of raindrops in them.


Finally after a scant 6-7mi we were at the main canyon mouth.


After another 1/2mi or so you take a sharp left up the first side canyon.  I believe Kauri has a report on the main canyon if you want to check that out.


This tightly packed, wonderfully colored conglomerate was found all the way up the canyon.  There must be a gorgeous wall of it up there somewhere...


Very quickly you get a feel for the kind of hike this canyon will be:  Loads of scrambling and dryfalls of all sizes.




All are pretty easy climbs for a while.








This was a slightly tricky slick chute to climb (that has carved out a nice alcove).  But the hand holds were great and the rock was solid (finally!).


Canyon opened up a bit after that.  For a moment.


Eventually we hit this ~30ft dryfall which had to be bypassed.  Which ended up being a double dryfall maybe 45ft total.  Our bypass scramble on the way up was a bit sketchy and we found a bit safer route on the way back.  Tip: Your best bet is to scramble up the left side (when facing the fall) about 500ft back down canyon.  The second part of the bypass is a slightly exposed climb down a seam in the rock back to the wash above the dryfall.  The angle of the rock (leaning away from the wash) and the grippiness of the rock make it not that bad. 


Cool fossil we found on the bypass.



It was at this point that I learned that we were out of Beta.  I figured this out by asking Brice how far the bridge was.  "No clue."  "What??"  Hahaha.  Turns out there's virtually no mentions of this bridge online much less any actual trip reports.  That's what I get for just tagging along and not doing my own research.  Lol.  Luckily I HAD downloaded all the maps and satellite of the area.  So we scoured that to make sure we didn't miss any targets up side canyons, since we were flying blind otherwise.  Hopefully we were in the right canyon anyway.

Then we found this.  As far as we know it's an undiscovered bridge at the mouth of a side canyon.  Of course that depends on your definition of a bridge.  Haha.  I dubbed it "Kickstand Bridge" for the stack of rocks in the middle of the mouth.  Opening is about 3-4ft high.  




Shortly after, another dryfall with a short easy bypass in really cool tilted rock rock layers.


Most were easily climbable though.


The canyon got progressively deeper.


At this point, we're expecting (or hoping anyway) to find this damned bridge right around the "next" corner.  With certainty of finding it now only a memory (for me anyway), the chance of missing it was high.  So we slowed our pace and inspected side canyons etc.  

Then we turned the corner to find this guy.  70-80ft behemoth.  


Since we were completely out of beta, we started looking around for bypass options.  Again, the path we took up the right side (facing the fall) of the wash was a bit sketchy.  But it worked.  We found an easier way down on the way back, 500-600ft down canyon also on the right side.  Scramble up to a high bench and walk that up canyon.  Another scramble up & over a small loose ridge and you can drop down in the canyon.  You have to be near the edge of the cliff to see where you can get down.  

But it is a high bypass.  


And it turned out to be a double fall.  Total is probably 100-120ft.  


We continued up canyon.  We only had one target on satellite and if it turned out to be a false bridge, we would have to think seriously about turning around and wondering if we missed it.  


Still a gorgeous canyon.


Brice was once again in danger of his Victory apple turning into a Disappointment apple.


We eventually hit a solid 20-25ft fall blocking the way.  If we were correct and our satellite target was Tucki Bridge, it was literally just out of sight at the top of this fall. 


Luckily it had really good holds.


Yes!  Tucki Bridge!  Phew.


It really doesn't look like this bridge will survive for that much longer.  It is loose fanglomerate strung between two hard rock pillars.  But it's pretty awesome.


Victory apple savored, we headed back down the wash.  I didn't take many photos on the way back.  Here's looking down the top of the big double fall again.


When we reached the mouth of the main canyon, we could see our trucks glinting in the sun 6-7mi away.  I would have been VERY happy if the hike ended here.  My knees and feet had taken plenty of abuse.  But that wasn't exactly an option.  So trudge on.  And trudge on.  

Another piece of the boardwalk we found on the way back.  This is a little over a mile southeast from the end of the Salt Creek Rd.


This was by far the most exhausting hike I've done in DEVA this year.  It wasn't that much longer than a few others I've done (clocking in at a hair under 17mi for us).  But it kicked my ass.  Not sure why.  Moon cycle?  Didn't eat my Wheatie's?  Heavier on the scrambling than the other longer ones?  No clue.  

Was it worth it?  Absolutely.

[MojaveGeek]

Thanks for the tour! Much appreciated as with the distance and the somewhat hairy sounding bypasses, out of my league, so enjoyed your scenery!

[Brice]

Nice writeup! I'm adding kickstand bridge to my personal list of major bridges. It passes my criteria of "can a full grown human get through it without belly crawling and without banging their head?" Granted, it barely passed that test, but it did pass!

[Kauri]

Well done on getting to Tucki Bridge, and cool find of "Kickstand Bridge"!

For what it's worth, what I recall NPS folks were using for qualifications for "major natural bridge" is:
- Must be water carved (otherwise it'd qualify as an arch if it's wind-carved)
- Must have been formed by water cutting underneath pre-existing rock/conglomerate (as opposed to a canyon wall slump, which instead is typically considered a "false natural bridge")
- Must be worthy of a visit on its own, or something along these lines (otherwise considered minor natural bridge--this is the one that's typically up for dispute)

[DeathValleyDazed]

Trip report of the month and maybe for 2023 unless you two top this one?

Steve Hall discovered a remote and difficult bridge on the east side of Tucki Mountain but with his site off line I'm not sure if it's this bridge or another canyon. Maybe someone can clarify.

Cools shots of the old Salt Creek Board Walk also.

[Kauri]

Steve Hall discovered a remote and difficult bridge on the east side of Tucki Mountain but with his site off line I'm not sure if it's this bridge or another canyon. Maybe someone can clarify.

This is the "remote and difficult bridge" by Tucki Mountain that Steve had written about on his site, but he didn't discover it. This one was discovered by a canyoneering group, I believe one led by Rick Kent and Abby Wines.

[Beardilocks]

Trip report of the month and maybe for 2023 unless you two top this one?

Oh don’t temp us.  Hahaha.  We’ll see what happens, but I’m not done yet.