AUTUMN 2024
We kayaked down the Green River in southern Utah for 8 days, from south of the town of Green River on I70 to the confluence with the Colorado River. This is a trip we have been thinking of for a few years now ever since paddling down the Colorado River to the Green River confluence in 2014, and it was worth the wait!
Our river distance was about 105 miles through two areas known as Labyrinth and Stillwater canyons, the latter being in Canyonlands National Park.
The Green River meanders through a beautiful desert canyon with steep cliffs for much of the way with access to lots of rocky side canyons for some remote hiking and scrambling. We wild camped by the river on sandy banks or rocky shelves and each day was a mix of mostly mellow paddling on still waters with the occasional ‘riffle’, along with exploring on foot.
Tex’s Riverways based in Moab, Utah provided a great service, renting us kayaks and some gear, taking us by dirt road to the entry point at Ruby’s Ranch, then transporting us from Spanish Bottom on the Colorado River by jet boat and truck back upstream on the Colorado River and on to Moab. The logistics all went super smoothly – they are a friendly and efficient team.
Part of the attraction of the Green River was that it allowed us to access remote canyons that we hadn’t visited along with an area rich in history; from native American cliff dwellings, granaries and pictograph/petroglyph artwork, ranchers, cowboys and mining to John Wesley Powell’s first European float down the river in 1869.
We set off at the end September 2024 and here are a few of the many highlights…
The chocolaty brown river was flat most of the way and provided a gentle flow and push of maybe 1-2mph which made for relaxed paddling and ever changing canyon scenery. Particulary interesting was the transition of rock layers as the river descended back through geological time.
We started with 2 days supplies of fresh water but managed to keep topping that up with relatively fresh water from side canyons thus avoiding drinking the silty, muddy Green River water (or taking all our water with us in the kayaks).
The hikes up side canyons and ridges were pretty fantastic, this is a superb area. Interestingly we didn’t see other people on any of the hikes.
For background and guidebook information the most comprehensive source was Michael R. Kelsey’s ‘River Guide to Canyonlands National Park‘ and we also had Belknap’s ‘Canyonlands River Guide‘ and made up our own topo maps using Caltopo software.
More photos here from our Pbase website.
A wee walk 