Last year, when Kent was deer hunting, he noticed there were several interesting benchmarks that were located east of Bryce Canyon National Park. With an offer, from our friend Bart and his brother Ben, to park our Teardrop on their Henrieville property, we decided it was time to go and locate some of these special little medallions. So, while most people were enjoying the sights of Bryce Canyon we headed out to the less traveled areas below Powell Point (the most prominent landmark in the area), to enjoy some early Fall hikes.
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Tom drove over, from Enoch, to meet us for this hike . . .
As always, it was a special treat to spend time with our good friend!
Thankfully, there was a nice pullout area and very little traffic on Hwy 12 where we began our hike |
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After a short walk along the highway, we headed north into Shingle Mill Hollow . . .
It was shaded and a little cool, as the morning sun had yet to reach the wash |
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| A colorful striped river rock laying in the mud from recent monsoon moisture |
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| Once out of the wash, we faced a formidable cliff wall that we had to find a way around |
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We decided the best approach was to circumnavigate the cliffs by staying close to the base . . .
Do you see Kent and Tom? |
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Once around the cliffs, and up on top, we came upon one of the largest juniper trees we have ever seen . . .
Tom gave it a thumbs up! |
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As we continued working our way up the ridge, beautiful Powell Point came into view . . .
Being the southern most tip of the Table Cliff Plateau, it can be seen from miles around |
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| Kent spotted this Striped Whipsnake . . . it was just over 4 feet in length! |
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Once we got up on top of the mesa, the views were amazing . . .
Now it was time to walk the rim southward to Stump Benchmark |
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| The arrow points to where the benchmark was located |
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| Stump Benchmark was placed here in 1959 . . . it was reached by helicopter |
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One of the two Copper Nails and Washer Reference Marks we successfully located . . .
Tom says these aren't all that rare, but for us, we find a kind of satisfaction in finding these instead of the more common medallion reference markers |
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The Benchmark was five feet from the edge of the rim rock . . .
and let us tell you, it was a shear cliff on the other side! |
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Heading back down, we came across this interesting hoodoo . . .
In a few days we'll be celebrating our 36th Anniversary! |
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On our way up, we had come across these ribbon remnants (probably from a Mylar balloon) . . .
Seeing them on the way down helped us locate the weakness in the cliff bands where we had come up |
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| Tom and Kent work their way down toward the wash |
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Back at Hwy 12, Stump Benchmark looks like it might have been doable from the west side . . . But things are not always what they seem . . .
The route we took up on the opposite side seems to have worked well for us! |
After a year of planning and dreaming of recovering Stump Benchmark it was now a reality. This five-mile r/t hike turned out to be an enjoyable trek and provided a good workout, with some route finding and magnificent views of the area. Now it was time to go find
Tropic and Cottam Benchmarks and then we would attempt
Cannonville Benchmark the following morning on our two-day excursion. If you'd be interested in doing this hike, for yourself (and we would highly recommend it!), you can click
here for a link to Tom's Peakbagger.com post.
