Backcountry Explorer

Embedded into the backcountry areas of Zion National Park, the Sierra Nevada, Death Valley National Park, and the Mojave Desert, Courtney Purcell's ramblings have also taken him all across the country and the world. From hiking, climbing and peakbagging in the Rockies, the Andes, the high volcanoes of Washington and Mexico, into the depths explored in spelunking, and the canyoneering of the Colorado Plateau, here you'll find trip reports, route beta and "stuff" relevant to the world of...

Aires Butte & Full Keyhole Canyon

Where: Zion National Park, Utah
When: April 2008
Partners: DB & Aron Ralston

DB just below the Aires Butte-South Ariel Peak col
Five years to the minute after Aron Ralston got his right arm pinned under a boulder in a lonely Utah slot canyon, he downclimbed past a dead deer in a slot and slid into a pool of water filled with maggots.

Meeting up the evening before, Aron, DB and I got started at a leisurely hour for a link-up of Aires Butte, a fun 4-pitch 5.5 slab climb that I'd already done twice, and Keyhole Canyon, a technical slot I'd done five times, on Zion National Park's east side. This time, we wanted to do the full Keyhole, dropping into the slot a quarter mile up-canyon from the usual spot that people know.

Aron leading the 1st pitch on Aires Butte
With a single chest deep wade for me, a climb-over for Aron, and a swim for DB, our wetsuits were not needed in the upper canyon, which featured quite a few nice narrows and some easy downclimbing, though we certainly appreciated them in the very chilly lower Keyhole. Water was somewhat low, but April can be a chilly month for Zion slots.

With smiles on our faces and our toes still warming, we returned to the car at the late hour of 7 p.m. and headed to Oscar's in Springdale for dinner.

DB belays Aron
TOPO

...those moments when time stands still. The catalysts are as varied as the individuals who pursue this path: a meteor shower; a night sky so star-filled that it snatches your breath; another rise of the sun over distant mountains vast and untouchable; dodging a rock careening crazily down a gully; a desperate icy struggle through whiteout and ground blizzard down to the safety of camp after an unsuccessful summit attempt; standing atop a mountain with a friend, the whole world at your feet, a blinding sun blazing out of a flawless sky, taking the time to watch that sun dip below the horizon even though camp is still many miles and many thousands of feet distant; stumbling over boulders and through brush in the darkness; watching the starlight and the storm wrest for possession of the night sky, seated on a narrow ledge beside your rope-mate with only the clothes on your back for shelter, shivering the night away, knowing that, sometime in a distant place you cannot now touch, the world will once again grow bright, the sun will rise, and you will look out on the infant day with new eyes.

-Bruce Binder

One final paragraph of advice: do not burn yourselves out. Be as I am - a reluctant enthusiast....a part-time crusader, a half-hearted fanatic. Save the other half of yourselves and your lives for pleasure and adventure. It is not enough to fight for the land; it is even more important to enjoy it. While you can. While it’s still here. So get out there and hunt and fish and mess around with your friends, ramble out yonder and explore the forests, climb the mountains, bag the peaks, run the rivers, breathe deep of that yet sweet and lucid air, sit quietly for a while and contemplate the precious stillness, the lovely, mysterious, and awesome space. Enjoy yourselves, keep your brain in your head and your head firmly attached to the body, the body active and alive, and I promise you this much; I promise you this one sweet victory over our enemies, over those desk-bound men and women with their hearts in a safe deposit box, and their eyes hypnotized by desk calculators. I promise you this; You will outlive the bastards.

-Edward Abbey