TRIP REPORT PHOTOS
Parking along Hwy 190 and looking toward our first goal, which would be to wrap around the left hillside in the distance. I can't tell you how many times I drove by this spot over the years and have seen cars parked here and wished I was hiking Indian Pass Canyon:
Shawn, Senta, and Kathy backpacking around the first hillside:
We got a bit mixed up on the next portion, as we should have stayed in the wash which wrapped around the hillside. As it ended up, we kind of took a shortcut cross-country. Here we are looking at the main wash off in the distance which we were trying to get back into. If you look closely in this picture, you can actually see the person who was lost looking around for the right way to go. The lost group actually headed to the right here, making a huge mistake:
Our group, however, chose the right wash and here we are backpacking down into it:
A long, wide stretch of the wash as we got closer to the canyon entrance:
At another critical junction, we avoided the mistake of heading toward the colorful hills in the distance and stayed on the correct route:
Up ahead we rounded a corner and found ourselves at the beginning of Indian Pass Canyon:
Check out the cool towering rock formations in the next two pictures:
And two pictures of the right and left canyon walls near the beginning:
As you can see, the canyon is scenic and colorful right from the start:
Heading into a gorgeous short set of rugged narrows made of conglomerate rock:
The sunlight was bright, so it's kind of hard to see, but this is the 18 foot 1st major dry fall of the canyon:
Two of our backpackers walking through the early narrows toward the dry fall:
The dry fall was way too dangerous to climb, so we backtracked and are now heading up an easy bypass:
Tremendously epic and beautiful scenery above the dry fall in Indian Pass Canyon:
Continuing up the canyon on a hot afternoon in late March:
The mountains and cliffs towered above us for basically the entire hike. This is a really scenic and fun canyon:
Passing by some nice looking walls which framed one side of the canyon:
Left to right, that's a fellow hiker, Senta, Kathy, and Shawn heading up the canyon:
Passing by a nasty mesquite tree which ripped my skin with some thorns:
A mixture of breccia rock and conglomerate rock much like natural concrete dominated through Indian Pass Canyon on a scale I had never seen before. It was literally everywhere and that made the walking quite nice:
Here the conglomerate rock meets up with another type of rock on the canyon wall:
Up ahead we are coming into the grotto area, which is one of the highlights of the canyon:
The main grotto with a dry fall and boulders attached to it:
Steve climbing the dry fall in the grotto area in order to move on:
Looking back down the dry fall and past the grotto to the entrance:
Looking further up the narrow grotto area. A steep but easy climb is necessary here:
Turning around after the short climb. This is a really interesting area:
Heading out of the grotto area. The orange colored streaks in the canyon wall started to catch our attention here:
Steve rounding a bend in the very colorful grotto area of Indian Pass Canyon:
Now we have reached the end of the grotto area narrows and are looking back:
The greenery and shrubs tell us that we have arrived at the Lower spring:
Plants growing tall as the canyon walls compressed down to a narrow slot:
In this slot, surface water flowing from Lower spring's seep was visible:
Climbing a short dry fall just above Lower spring and looking back:
A wall of conglomerate rock that had to be climbed the next day:
And that was the end of our hiking for the first day. After backpacking 7.2 miles and reaching Lower spring, we set up camp in the canyon above it:
The sun set and the moon rose over Indian Pass Canyon as our group of 5 enjoyed a good night's sleep:
The next morning, we left our camp as it was and started to dayhike up the rest of Indian Pass Canyon:
Breccia rock and conglomerate rock were everywhere once again. From what I understand, breccia rock has angular distinct edges to the rock fragments while conglomerate rock has rounded edges:
This cave and overhang were right in the middle of the canyon and we had to go around it:
The canyon narrowed down in some spots, but it was mostly wide with grand scenery:
Check out the variety of different rock types and colors in this section:
Our group hiking in the middle of the trenches, which are small natural channels through the conglomerate rock:
Another example of the never ending trenches we would either walk through or up on the sides:
We finally reached Poison Spring and it had some beautiful natural pools of flowing water, as seen in the next two pictures:
Another part of Poison Spring had water passing through mossy areas with grass and plants growing:
Shawn dropping down into a plunge pool (not the main one) we came across which we were not expecting:
Close up of the plunge pool with reeds growing out of it. It almost looked like a duck pond with no ducks:
Look closely at the surface we were walking across here. You can see that conglomerate rock has covered the ground everywhere and it was like walking on concrete:
One of my favorite pictures from our Indian Pass Canyon hike. Hiking with the butterflies was a really fun and memorable aspect of our trip:
Continuing to work our way into upper Indian Pass Canyon:
At this point we have reached Upper spring, which had a lot of overgrown plants in the canyon:
There was a bit of surface water in Upper spring, but it looked like the worst possible option of the three available springs:
Mountains and peaks a thousand feet or more above us:
We found a few large stacks of cairns which marked the old mining boundaries:
Just past Upper spring is this 15 foot dry fall that Senta is climbing:
A fellow hiker is on the left climbing the first dry fall of her life. She did a great job:
Very majestic scenery once again as the canyon heads into some sharp bends with side canyon options:
In the next four pictures, take a moment to appreciate the colorful streaks of varying sizes in the rocks and walls of the upper canyon:
Here the canyon has constricted down and there is only a narrow slot to walk through:
We next came upon this grassy area which held one of the canyon highlights just beyond:
Shawn looking down at the legendary main Plunge Pool of Indian Pass Canyon:
Above the Plunge Pool, this dry fall blocked progress farther up the canyon:
View from the base of the Plunge Pool of the dark water. Shawn carefully scrambled around the pool and climbed the dry fall without falling in and getting soaked:
The rest of us knew our limits and used the bypass. Here we are at the top of the Plunge Pool and looking back down at it:
Look at the pretty stripes and patterns in the rock:
At 10.4 miles into the hike (counting both days), we reached the base of the 50 foot dry fall:
Shawn bypassed most of the dry fall and then climbed the upper section:
Here you can see Shawn climbing the upper section. He's definitely a climber. I'm not going to talk about the crazy stunt he pulled over by the Plunge Pool:
In this picture, you can see Steve heading up to Indian Pass, while Shawn is in the background celebrating his successful bid to reach the top of the dry fall:
Looking down at the dry fall and the vertical section which has to be bypassed:
This was the final viewpoint we hiked up to for the day. Indian Pass is still about 3/4 of a mile away from here, but there isn't anything special to see there. Our group was a bit tired and we still had to backpack out, so we turned around here:
On the way back, Shawn stopped at Lower spring to pump some more water for the group:
These are the seeps of Lower spring. Water flows out of the small holes in the rock and then cascades down into a stream. Upon filling up our bottles here, we packed up camp, backpacked out, helped the injured girl along the way, battled with some gale force winds, and reached our car before sunset:
