White Rim Road and Moab Day Trips
The White Rim Road is a 100-mile loop in Utah’s Canyonlands National Park. It is a mix of rugged Jeep road, gravel, slickrock, and some pavement. To experience it via motorized vehicle or to camp at any of the campgrounds on the road, a backcountry permit is needed. We wanted to bikepack it over 2-3 days so Irena nabbed a permit when they opened up in November. Our plan was to head to Moab a week before the White Rim ride and then stay a week afterwards so we could maximize opportunities to explore the area. Our friend Carey was coming down from Boise for the White Rim ride and some adventuring with us around Moab too.
There is no water on the route, other than the Green River, which is notorious for being so silty that it clogs filters almost instantly. We would need to cache water and carry more than usual with us. We would be carrying all three days’ worth of food with us as well since there’s no resupply. Temperatures in the 90s were forecasted so we were generous in our estimates of how much water we’d need. The day before starting the ride, we hiked 10 miles roundtrip to cache 30 liters of water at Murphy Campground, which would be our camp spot on the first night at mile 44. Carey also drove out to the top of the climb out of Mineral Bottom to cache one gallon for day 3. We felt confident we would have plenty of water. We even joked about taking showers.
On day 1, we rolled out of the Island in the Sky Visitor Center by around 8:40am and the day was already getting warm. The first day would prove to take much longer than we anticipated. There were unplanned gear-mishap stops but we also intentionally took our time, exploring points of interest and stopping for pictures. By the afternoon it was very hot. Our Wahoo’s both read over 100 degrees. We got to Murphy as day was turning to dusk. This proved to be helpful for two reasons: 1) we got to do the insane hike-a-bike up to Murphy in the shade and 2) we weren’t lacking for shade options at camp.
We started day 2 by drinking, drinking, and more drinking as we broke down camp. We thought we were flush with extra water but we only ended up with about 3 or 4 liters remaining from the 30 we’d cached once we’d all filled up. We had all consumed much more than anticipated on the first day. Irena squished the flexible water bag with the leftovers into her pack and we rolled out. We did math on whether we’d need to think about rationing and decided we didn’t need to. Day 2 was a shorter day at only 27 miles, and we knew we would be riding along the Green River soon and could dunk to cool down if need be. The river corridor provided a new type of beautiful scenery with lush vegetation along the banks. We hardly saw anyone all day. There was flooding on the route a little ways past our day 2 campground, making the road impassable to motorized vehicles. We’re pretty sure this is why we enjoyed very little vehicle traffic on most of the trip. The shorter day had one significant downfall. We got to Hardscrabble (our campground) at around 12:30pm and there was very little shade. A scrawny young cottonwood and a pit toilet offered the best options. Irena went and laid in a gulley by the river where it was a few degrees cooler. Sarah sat in the pit toilet for a while. Carey draped her quilt over a shrub to make shade. We basically laid around sweating all afternoon.
Determined to beat some of the heat on day 3 and hit the big climb up from Mineral Bottom in the shade, we were up at 5am. It was a stunning morning. The light was gorgeous and made for some of the best pictures of the trip. We easily found a walkaround for the flooding and were soon passing outside the boundary of Canyonlands National Park. The climb out of the canyon was steady and steep but rideable and over before we knew it. We were really happy to have gotten there early enough to avoid direct sun while climbing. We retrieved the gallon of water that Carey had stashed at the top and had good laughs over the epic supply of toilet paper in the pit toilet there. The remainder of the route would be on wide, often straight gravel roads (and then pavement) where you can see the path ahead for miles. Neither of us loves this type of riding but dreaming of margaritas in Moab was a nice carrot to keep us going. We got back to the Visitor Center and quickly packed up, bought some stickers, and headed back to Moab.
We were surprised by how much water we ended up consuming (and no, there were no showers). On day 1, Carey started with 10L, Irena with 9L, and Sarah with 8.5L. We used all 30L that we’d cached at Murphy and we used the spare gallon at the top of the climb. Carey finished with 3L left, Sarah with 2L, and Irena with 2L. To summarize, over the three days, we had a supply of about 62L and consumed about 55L.
Prior to White Rim, we had gone on short rides every evening with Carey after we’d both spent the daytime doing work (Irena) and schoolwork (Sarah). Here (below) is a smattering of photos from those rides. Dead Horse State Park was our favorite.
Carey headed back to Boise a couple of days after finishing White Rim but we stuck around for a week hiking in the area. The land around Moab is so spectacular. It left us speechless. The Tribes whose cultural heritage in this area is most well-known through written and oral histories are the Ute (Noochew), Navajo (Dineh), Paiute (Nuwuvi), and Hopi (Hisatsinom). We felt privileged to be able to experience these Indigenous Peoples’ ancestral lands.
