Desert Traipsing
Hudson and I spent ten days exploring bits of the desert SW for his spring break. He needed a break from the internet and we wanted to do some mountain biking. Our goal was to check out the Hurricane MTB Festival but we also wanted to do some off-road exploring, camping and hiking. The agency has also been working on a project for a GPS mapping app client and I wanted to do some route scouting and tracking in the trails and backroads near Las Vegas.
A lunch break at the International Car Forest in Goldfield, Nevada
Camping along La Madre trail on the outskirts of Las Vegas
Architectural tourism: As we passed through Las Vegas, I showed Hudson one of the more important pieces of architecture in the city. This is a medical building designed by Frank Gehry during his ‘crumpled paper’ phase. This is the Cleveland Clinic — Center for Brain Health
An afternoon ride on the trails in Bootleg Canyon above Boulder City.
Exploring the edges of Muddy Mountain Wilderness N of Las Vegas
Exploring the Bitter Springs Backcountry Byway route.
I normally really don’t like seeing graffiti in nature but I reacted differently to this piece. One, it’s a well done piece of urban art rather than the typically mindless tagging. Two, it’s done on a man-made object (concrete dam) rather than on the surrounding boulders. Three, it’s subject matter is of an owl which is endemic to the area (I fell asleep listening to an owl hooting in the rocks above us the previous night).
Gold Butte National Monument
Camping at Little Finland in Gold Butte National Monument, Nevada
Grand Canyon-Parashant National Monument
Toquerville Falls
Riding MTB and Camping on Gooseberry Mesa, Hurricane, Utah
Camping at Red Cliffs NCA
Hiking Yankee Doodle Canyon in the Red Cliffs NCA
Las Vegas Trails: The next day, I mapped the Angel Peak and Madre trails with members of the UZJ100 and Vegas Toyota Offroad clubs. We started with four trucks but the trail was rowdy enough that we lost one.
For our last night in Vegas, we ate at SushiSamba (always great!) and then walked 6+ miles along the strip. I’ve been there so many times over the years for work that I didn’t bother to take pictures other than snapping this shot while watching the fountains.
It’s 850 miles from Vegas to Black Butte. 14+ hrs of driving w/ plenty of fuel stops for the thirsty V8 in Lupo. We stopped in Black Butte to take advantage of a wonderful cabin for the night.
FINI
Thanks for visiting. Please check out our other adventures.
About the Author: Matthew Mangus is an accomplished outdoorsman with almost 50 years of experience exploring and recreating in the outdoors but is still learning new things every day. Matthew serves as the Creative Director for mangai.rollin, an experiential and content marketing agency that works and plays in the automotive, outdoor and vices industries.
