Crown Jewel of the Colorado Plateau: Dark Canyon Packraft

Many desert canyons feature bedrock channels, and many desert drainages feature large scale snowpack in wet years. The overlap is small, and the degree to which Dark Canyon has flushed all of its sediment to leave behind miles of bedrock slots, slides and ledges is truly unique. A hardshell crew paddled the lower canyon in the exceptional 2019 spring, and the 2023 spring is even better. Here, we explore over 2 days the lower 8 miles of Dark Canyon with Alpacka Valkyries. Flow variation from peak to trough was extreme but we were able to paddle low flows the first day and medium flows the second day into the Colorado and out to Hite.