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But I made it fine and the reason I'm flying into Page is to start what should be an epic 2 months of hiking. I'll be hiking a route called the Deseret Hiking Route (DHR). Not "Desert", but "Deseret", notice the extra E. Deseret was the name of a giant proposed region around Utah (including parts of 8 other states) by early Mormon settlers.
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I'll steal a description of the DHR from the planning guide:
The Deseret Hiking Route (DHR) is a roughly 1,000 mile route through the heart of the American West. It begins on the Utah/Arizona border and runs north through Utah and southern Idaho before terminating in the Sawtooth Mountains of central Idaho. The DHR is a route chock-full of world-class beauty and offers the prospective hiker the opportunity to explore amazing and oft-overlooked landscapes. The DHR is completely unmarked and undesignated by any state or federal agency. For the experienced long-distance hiker, one who takes responsibility for their own route choices, personal safety, and happiness, I can think of few extant routes that can deliver the kind of satisfaction that the DHR offers.
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Sounds pretty awesome! This route was created by Kevin "Larryboy" DeVries. It's probably best for me to link to Larryboy's resources to further describe things for anyone interested.
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One thing I find interesting that he mentions is that he knows of only 2 others who have hiked a North/South route across Utah (well at least as a thru-hike as opposed to like settling America). Lots of people have hiked a East/West route on the Hayduke, but it really does surprise me that Pepperflake, Dirtmonger and Larryboy would possibly be the only 3 to have walked a North/South route (I don't want to infer that this is definitive but more of a, well we don't know anyone else per the deep internets and hiking community). Utah is just such a great state and it just kinda seems like others would have walked North/South across the state.
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Anyway, I am the first person to attempt to hike all of Larryboy's route so thanks for that Larryboy. I've weirdly never been that motivated to create my own route. I always have things I want to hike and by the time I hike them someone else has created another cool route I want to hike. So far my sweet spot is 3rd finisher. 3rd on the Hot Springs Trail. 3rd on the Desert Trail. 4th on the National Scenic Trails. And pretty early on a ton of other hikes. Anyway, I don't know where I was going with this. Maybe a word of gratitude to these folks who enjoy creating routes, scouting them and hiking them. There is a big difference between hoping there is water on that topo map spring from 50 years ago and at least one person telling you that there was in fact water there at some point 2 years ago.
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Anyway, I don't have much more to write. Other than Larryboy's resources there's really nothing else to read about the route and it's best enjoyed by just hiking it anyway. Hopefully my daily entries will be more interesting than this first entry!
