I’m heading out to the Labyrinth Canyon in early September, and am interested to hear about cool places to check out along the way down river. Will be putting in at Green River and taking out at Mineral Bottom. Any insight would be great! Take care.
Green river
Get Michael R Kelsey’s “River guide to Canyonlands NP & vicinity” ISBN 944510-07-8. He fully describes every side canyon, attraction, & more history of the area then you’ll care to read.
Wife & I used it on 9-04 trip from Green R to confluence, head of Cataract Canyon, & paddle back up Colorado to Potash. You’re gonna love the trip !
Trin Alcove
Be sure to camp there. We did a couple of years ago and it’s absolutely gorgeous. A beautiful side canyon with a stream running through it to explore.
Did the Green this April from
Green River to Spanish Bottom in ten days. The current was moving so it wasn’t difficult to make distance. I used the Kelsey book which is very good and the Belknap river guide which is good but doesn’t have GPS data. Frequently, you’ll find it difficult to find a clear spot to land because of the Tamarisk lining the shore. Don’t expect to find a large clear landing spot; instead, plan on doing some scrabbling to get through the tamarisks. If you can find a map with GPS data that would help greatly (assuming you have a GPS), since it is at times difficult to know exactly where you are at which makes it easy to miss something. Paddling upstream isn’t much of an option when you drift past a take-out or wait too long looking for a better place to land.
confluence to Potash
You paddled upriver to potash…I thought of that but thought the current too strong (i,ve only been there in the spring). how long did it take to get from the confluence to Potash? thks… terry
Spanish Bottom - Potash
Terry
It took my wife & I paddling a Jensen 18 3.5 days to ascend Colorado from Spanish Bottom to Potash. The only 2 difficult sections were the Slide (use the eddies)& Indian Raps. We paddled a total of 7:40, 6:13, 5:41, & 3:01 on those 4 days. Colorado gauge @ Cisco was running @ between 3230 & 3560 cfs during that time. It’s very doable & think of fun you can have in Moab w/ $$ you save on jetboat shuttle fees !
i paddled up to potash too.
Read the Green River trip reports on this site about my 01 trip.
I did it from green river town topotash road as a training run for a canoe race.
Took me 21 hours from green river to confluence and then about 19 hours from confluence to potash road. Current is strong but if youve paddled upstream before you know that you can find the slowest as well as all the back eddies that actually flow upstream. Its about a 2 mile an hour pace. One stroke at a time will get you there.
nm
Labyrinth
I have gone from Crystal Geyser (S of Green River) to Mineral Bottom in 4.5 days in early September. It was nasty hot, we spent a lot of time up to our waist in the water to stay cool. That was probably the right amount of days. The river was slow, probably 1.5 mph, so we paddled a lot.
Our favorite hike was to the gooseneck overlook, we did it first thing in the morning before it got hot.
Bring your lawn chairs (learned that from my first trip on the Green). The two-cooler system is a good one, and should let you keep things cold for at least four days. (One cooler is packed up with blocks of ice and some food, and then taped shut and not opened until day three). You probably know that you need to bring your water, although you can use cooler melt water as a supplement.
Tex’s riverways is a good shuttle service, I have used them a couple of times. Nice to leave your car in a secure parking lot in Moab for the duration.
Enjoy your trip
Richard
shuttle
– Last Updated: Aug-17-06 6:15 PM EST –
Thanks for all the tips. How much does Tex charge for the shuttle? Right now I have someone to shuttle my car from Green River to Mineral Bottom, but worry somewhat about having it brought to the take out, as it's a Toyota Carolla. What is that about bringing your own water? Can't filter the Green for some reason?
Doll’s House
From Spanish Bottom, we hiked up to the Doll’s house. It was just about the most spectacular thing ever. I also enjoyed a hike up to find five-hole-arch (which we saw, but did not reach due to a wrong turn). The views from the top are fantastic.
Shuttle
I don’t remember the road to Mineral Bottom as being difficult, just scary. Huge dropoffs. No way would I drive or ride that road if it was wet, mud is slippery. However, in dry conditions, a passenger car should work fine. However, I have only ridden that road with someone else driving, I have not driven it.
You would need to call Tex’s to get a price on the shuttle.
Richard
Filtering water
The water in the Green River is too silty to filter. Standard practice is too haul all you need–about a gallon per day.
For some reason unknown to physicists, the water I hauled seemed to weigh about 100 pounds per gallon, especially at the end of the day.
filtering
thanks. i did find some info on that, and see that it can also be somewhat salty in places, it seems. glad there’s no portages on this section!
Big Canoe
We were fortunate to have a 20’ tripper XL. That boat was luxurious, holding the big groover, all the water, and a couple of coolers. All that weight made it very stable, yet it was still fast. Never having to portage it was, of course very nice.
I felt sorry for the folks crammed in tight sea-boats on this river.