Day 5: To Kwagunt Hollow

Day 5

October 31, 2013

Backpack to the Junction of Kwagunt Hollow and Jumpup Canyon

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Today's route stats:

Distance: 5.0 miles

Elevation Gain: 100 feet

Elevation Loss: 1100 feet

Our goal for the day was the junction of Kwagunt Hollow and Jumpup Canyon. Last night we decided to hike back along the Esplanade and to either hike down Kwagunt Hollow, Sowats Canyon, or go all the way back to Jumpup and head down past Lower Jumpup Spring and climb down the makeshift ladder at the pouroff. But in the morning I suggested continuing on with our original route down Indian Hollow. Everyone wanted to do more Esplanade hiking, and some thought the Indian Hollow route was too short. But I love Indian Hollow, so I decided to do it solo. At the last minute Fred decided to join me. He was pretty exhausted and wanted an easier day (Fred is 79!). So we headed off in different directions, expecting to meet up with the rest of our group at Kwagunt and Jumpup in late afternoon.

Fred and I had only 5 miles go travel, although all of it is off-trail. The others would need to cover about 10 miles.

The hike down through Indian Hollow was gorgeous, as usual. The sun was out and it was starting to warm up. By the time we got to George Steck's Over-Your-Head pool, it was fairly warm and clear. But the pool was still in shadow, and since I wanted to take a dip, we decided to take a long break and wait for the sun.

Once the pool was in full sun, I dove in and quickly scurried out again. It was cold, but very refreshing. We then continued down Indian Hollow, past Ojojojo and to the next large pouroff. This is bypassed on creek-right. This level is also the top of the Redwall Limestone. We stayed on top of the Redwall, thus avoiding a large chockstone and pool farther down in Indian Hollow.

Travel on top of the Redwall is generally pretty easy, but the first half mile or so required some scrambling through some huge boulders and brush. We rounded the corner above the junction of Indian Hollow and Jumpup, heading for Kwagunt. The bed of Jumpup slowly rose as we headed for Kwagunt so that we only had to drop down a few dozen feet to the canyon bottom at Kwagunt. No one else was there, of course, so we hung out in the shade and took a nap.

The rest of our group showed up a couple of hours later, around 4:00. They were pretty tired. There are no good campsites at the mouth of Kwagunt, so we hiked up a little ways. I have camped at a nice spot in Kwagunt between two pouroffs, but no one wanted to hike up that far. We found plenty of water and an okay place to camp about two or three hundred yards up Kwagunt.

It was Halloween and Marcey placed some "scary" Halloween candles around our camp.


Indian Hollow.	Steck's Over-Your-Head Pool.	Looking into Indian Hollow from Redwall.