peter brierton

Feb 1, 20238 min read

Day 17. Lions n Spiders n Snakes Oh My!

Wednesday January 25, 2023

Wow out camping and no service for two and a half days - I fell behind on blogging! But on the other hand...man was it worth it! Spending a couple of days in Palo Duro Canyon just off the hook beautiful....

I woke up Wednesday morning at the Marriott in Amarillo and no margarita hangover...sweet! I finished some blogging, had some breakfast and showered, packed up the jeep - readying it for a camping adventure. I first headed over to the local bike shop here for two reasons. I had my road tire still flat from that Florida ride and figured maybe they can get the dang tire off the wheel lol. I hadn’t tried again, and didn’t really want to actually lol. I spoke with the owner about the issue - the fact that I had no luck riding with tubeless sealant in the tires and went to tubes, and now how near impossible it is to get the tire off!!!

He suggested putting sealant inside the tube itself which sounded like the best of both worlds so I left the tire with him to take care of that. If I don’t make it out of the canyon alive this dude just gained a decent wheel lol.

Oh! Did I mention the shop owners name was Nugget? For real! Nope I can't make this up! I kinda got curious about why someone would name their kid after a rock so I looked it up. So let's take a look at that...

According to Maryann's Webster, nugget yields a few definitions:

A large thick man in Australia.

A lump of something.

Anything of great value, like wisdom.

A bite size piece of chicken.

Well he was huge, but I don't know if he was Australian. Didn't sound like it anyway. That also crosses out bite size? But I do like the idea of filling the tube with sealant so I'm running with he has biker wisdom of great value. OK good name choice mom n pops.

Before I left his shop I wanted to get a scoop on the tenting and bike trails etc. in the Palo Duro canyon. Are the trails near the sites? Is one camping area better than the others? Geez I noticed some sites had no water or bathroom...I mean I was ready with a new porta potty AND shovel but if I could choose...I'll take one with that shower like the Marriott had last night, geez I stood in that one for 15 minutes in glory lol.

I had two main concerns about the camping:

One: I want to camp near the bike trail cuz if I had the tent popped open I wouldn’t be able to drive to a trailhead (funny how we bikers think huh!?).

Second: I'll take the site furthest from rattlesnake, mountain lion and tarantula activity. All native to this canyon. All three are probably not the bestest of friends with water fowl traveling on a bike.

I think my priorities are in that order too.

Close to good trails first. Not being mountain lion breakfast second lol.

Bike first. Breath later. Priorities man...

Nugget was kinda generic in his response though…all the sites are ok, but good luck getting one since they usually book out months in advance, gotta reserve online etc...dang kinda of a downer dude all of a sudden. OK maybe the name definition 'lump of something' does fit better. Ha! Juries out for now.

I left the shop and called a Texas recreation phone number I found and the lady there hooked me up with everything I needed. From info on the camp sites to booking my reservation right then. Perfect. Easy Shmeezy.

Check-in time was after 2:00pm so I decided to grab a ‘last meal’ before I entered the "Lions! Spiders! And snakes oh my!" zone. But wait! Have mountain lions ever seen a duck before!? Would they wanna play with this one like a baby that gets a new rattle? Or would they rather devour me as a delicacy (do mountain lions even like duck?) (if they do how do they like it prepared?) Geez so many questions! I shoulda asked that lady!

Five Guys burgers-n-Fries loaded me up, a burger, fries and shake equaling 2800 calories! WOW. That should sustain me for a bit in the dessert canyon desert huh!?

I actually felt myself get a little nervous as I drove to the park, part excitement but some nervousness too. I had the realization of being alone in a park, in unfamiliar territory, with unfamiliar wildlife and no communication...

So I decided to play some kick @ss music and fired up Luke Combs “Can I get an Outlaw” song. Played it like four times on the way there to build some confidence and start feeling like a rebel cowboy lol. Definitely helped my confidence level but still don't think I could outdraw anyone at high noon. Unless it was Pictionary then maybe I'd could kick some butt. I draw a pretty mean stick figure lemme tell ya.

The lady at the state check in was super awesome and I had a million questions for her. Lions? Bears lol? Furry spiders? I mean walking thru Charlottes web back home is freaky enough to me - let alone a spider that has to comb it's hair before it leaves for work that day...yuck! She put me at ease though. No one’s died this year and there hasn’t been any recent sightings of lions. Just stay on the trails and you’ll be fine. Stay on the trails!? Is that like don’t put your finger in the cage at the zoo? I mean, if I take a step off the trail, "into the cage", is it like George the Gorilla rips ya finger off for fun!? Is it like WHAM! Spider bite!!? Wait! What if I think I’m on the trail but…I’m not!? WTFudge!? I’m a New Yorker. I can navigate three tunnels, a bridge and fifteen lanes of traffic merging into two lanes - but canyon trails? I ride on roads where the biggest danger is Muffin, driving her daddy’s Mercedes flings her nail file out of the convertible in front of me...

And wait! The year is only like three weeks old! Did someone die December 31st!? Or maybe the lion just played with them for hours like a new little toy rubber ducky!?

Damn city slicker I am for sure.

I arrived at the campsite about 3:30pm and decided to drive the entire perimeter of the roads inside the canyon walls here to kinda get a good lay of the land. Also figured it would help with interpreting the trail maps if I'm familiar with some of the terrain and land.

Then...I decided I have enough light to get a ride in! Sweet!

Grabbed the bike, snacks, some water and made off looking for the Upper Comanche Trail. Figure I had enough light to do that one…and it dumped back onto a road which would make it easy to get back if it were to get dark down here. I'm literally in the depths of the canyon, with sheer walls rising around me in a deep red clay color. Gorgeous but seems chillier and a bit darker already. I grabbed onto a trail and headed off thinking it was the Comanche one, but about 1/4 mile in noticed the signpost had a K on it. Checked the trail map and found where I was. This would work too. Great to check my bearings against the map as it gave me a scale of sorts and started building some confidence in being able to read the map. It didn't show difficulty of trails though.

It’s about 34 degrees now, but in the canyon if the sun is on you it actually feels pretty good. Working up a sweat actually! I took the Kiowa (K) trail to it’s end in one direction and found where it connected to the Upper Comanche trail for the return to the camp. The Upper Comanche was much more challenging with some mud sections that the bike just slid backwards on in the climbs. A red clay kinda mud too! Literally no traction...slide back down lol. Pretty fun actually. Made me laugh. ! And messy wow. This trail also rimmed the side walls of the canyon in area’s with a steep drop-off in spots…not so cool lol. My legs tend to get the ‘willies’ when I get close to edges. If it wasn’t muddy...it was rocky. But oh so gorgeous! Hopefully some of the pics capture all this.

It was 5:30 when I made it back to the site and sunset was about 6:00 - so perfect. I tried a bit to wash some of the “mud off the tires” and popped the tent up. The temperature dropped rapidly as the sun went behind the canyon wall so I decided to have dinner in the jeep with the heat on for a bit. A PB-n-Honey-n-Granola sandwich. So good. Not quite Five Guys, (more like just a one-guy) (is that a Yelp rating?) But delish.

I had originally planned on getting into the tent, reading, studying and writing the days blog up before sleeping. But there is no wifi or cell service of any kind here actually (I put Strava on as a goof and it did record so I thought that was weird). So I figured I would type the blog up onto a ‘Pages’ document while the thoughts were fresh in my mind and paste it over to the blog when I get out of the canyon. But holy cat with the sun down the temps began to plummet and I could barely feel my fingers! This cowboy ain't typing' cat!!

I clothed myself in a base layer (legs and chest), sweatpants, a long sleeve T, a hoodie, a hat, in a sleeping bag with a blanket over it...and passed out by 8:00pm.

Inside

Kind of hard to paint a picture of what goes on inside as I ventured out into unknown territory, unfamiliar trails, in deep canyon Texas state park with no one around at all -let alone anyone that I knew close by. To sit and read this is one thing, to place yourself on that trail not knowing which way to turn as the sun drops to the rim of the canyon and the temperature matches it's fall is a whole 'nuther world...

It can seem like no big deal but everyone deals with different emotions that crop up in different situations. Riding in a deep canyon, never having set foot in this state before with subtle rumors of mountain lions (but no recent sightings…great) and tarantulas and rattlesnakes and subfreezing temperatures just around the corner - I gotta admit there was a lot of "are you sure you should be doing this Ducky?" thoughts floating around my head lol!

Outside

The perfect cliche' - "There are no words to describe" the raw beauty of what I've seen in just a few short hours here applies. To stand at the rim of the canyon and everywhere the eye can see stretches a raw, rugged, red personality of nature of which I've never encountered before.

The small cactus plants, the snow on top of red clay and mud, the tremendous rocks that are jutting out precariously balanced in a position that just doesn't seem physically possible. Or the smaller stones that are strewn all across the paths having fallen from amazing heights just off my side. Just an amazing array of nature painting an artful feminine design right alongside a display of a 'masculine strength against all odds' cragginess. A picture, or view, when captured as a whole... mind silencing, jaw dropping, beauty.

Upside

Wow! To arrive at Palo Duro Canyon after a few days driving in cold snow...Crazy good! And the timing of the weather has been perfect...no precipitation forecasted...awesome.

downside

Well sleeping in a tent in nineteen degrees ain't the greatest lemme tell ya. Plus sounds of something that cannot quite get the garbage bin open outside had these duck feathers on end a bit lol. Felt a bit like Dorothy there for a minute -There's no place like the Marriott, there's no place like the Marriott, there's no place like the Marriott...

Every Which Way but East

Staying in the canyon for two nights - tomorrow going to tackle a few of the harder longer trails...Life is great!

The Visitor center at the top of the Palo Duro canyon.

Driving just a mile away from the canyon...flat...and then the earth just disappears!

The road that begins the descent into the canyon

#18 is my home for two nights!

Trail map

SSSSSShhhh don't tell anyone this wannabe yahoo rode a bit on a foot path

Some trail shots

Dropoffs are not full absorbed by looking at a pic that's for sure!. Even just the rocks sliding underneath the tires add to the sketchiness of being a duck - on a bike - on a mountain : )