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From: Tom Martin <tomhazel_at_grand-canyon.az.us> subject: [Paddlewise] San Juan River below Clay Hills, Monument Valley UT, Long Date: Mon, 30 Aug 2004 21:04:49 -0700 · This archive was generated by hypermail 2.4.0 : Thu Aug 21 2025 - 16:33:39 PDT

The San Juan Revisited, by Tom Martin

The following is a write up of a day trip by 5 folks in 3 inflatables from
Fatt Falls to Nokai Canyon on a flowing San Juan River, August 27 and 28,
2004.

On Friday, August 27, 2004, Arizonas monsoon weather had been stalled as
high pressure dominated the desert southwest and a 5 year drought continued.
>From Kayenta we drove the road north into Monument Valley, taking the
turn-off to Gouldings, then taking the road toward Oljeto. We finally turned
off the asphalt onto the well-kept dirt road that leads to Piute Farms.

The sun had set behind Monitor Butte when we arrived at the Farms. A small
dirt road led from the old Piute Farms Marina location west northwest,
winding around low hills. We left the truck at the marina location and
walked the = mile down the small road, letting our ears be the guide toward
an obvious roar of falling water. The road ended in deep sand, and in 30
yards walking through tamarisk we crested a small rise to look north to Fatt
Falls.

Piute Farms is on the San Juan River, about two miles downstream of Clay
Hills, the Hills being the normal take out for a river trip down the San
Juan. It was here at Piute Farms, just below where the San Juan met the
headwaters of Lake Powell, that the San Juan Marina was operated for about 2
years in 1980-1981. Since then, Piute Farms has silted in significantly. Low
water in Lake Powell in the early 1990s caused a significant waterfall to
form in the eastern end of the Piute Farms area. The San Juan experienced
major flooding in the fall of 2003. That late September flood, combined with
the lowest lake level in 30 years, re-routed the San Juan channel at Piute
Farms, and forced the river to go over a sandstone outcropping. The result
is Fatt Falls, a cross river 10 foot drop. The falls are named by Kayenta
locals after Jim Fatt, Navajo elder and medicine man, who has the grazing
allotment here at Piute Falls. See HYPERLINK
"http://www.vishnutemplepress.com/SanJuanwaterfall.html"http://www.vishnutem
plepress.com/SanJuanwaterfall.html

The falls looked smaller than I had remembered them, though still
impressive. The San Juan was flowing about 450 cubic feet per second. The
water was the perfect temperature for swimming, and just a little cloudy.
Hazel and I walked down to the foot of the Falls where one can appreciate
the size of the 10 foot drop at the falls. We walked back to the truck in
the twilight and made dinner. We were soon joined by Denny, a school
librarian at Kayenta, along with Rick and Kate, a math teacher and a nurse
from Page. Talk lasted long into the night, as we identified mutual friends
and talked about the state of the west, the country and the world. A near
full moon flowed through a quilt of clouds.

On the morning of Saturday, September 28, we split into two groups. Hazel,
Kate and Rick took the three inflatables to the foot of the falls, while
Denny and I did the shuttle. The shuttle required us to drive south back
toward Oljeto, then turn back northwest into Copper Canyon. The wide dirt
road quickly turned into a dirt track as it entered the Copper Canyon wash.
In places the road follows the wash bed, and would be impassable when wet.
In a couple of places, the road leaves the wash bed to traverse low sandy
benches along the wash. Four wheel drive is a must. We saw 6 burros on the
drive in. As we neared the San Juan, the road climbs out of the Copper
Canyon wash a couple of hundred feet in elevation onto the top of a
sandstone bench. The remainder of the drive was along the top of the bench.
We reached the confluence of Copper Canyon and the San Juan in about an
hour. It was here that I had assumed we would leave a vehicle. Denny and I
parked and looked for a route to the river, flowing with a good current just
100 yards away. What I had not appreciated from a scouting visit a few weeks
earlier was a 60 foot high sandstone cliff separated us from the river. This
cliff makes up the west side of Copper Canyon, and to my surprise, wrapped
its way from running north-south in Copper Canyon around to an east-west
running cliff. The river abutted the base of the cliff just below the
confluence of Copper Canyon. After a 15 minute reconnaissance, we realized
we would have to drive west to Nokai Canyon, where Denny knew of a way to
get down through the cliff.

We drove another 10 minutes west, around the northern tip of No Mans Mesa,
to Nokai Canyon. Here we found an easy break through the now 120 foot high
cliffs leading down to a silt bench. It looked like we should be able to
take out in the sandy wash at the confluence of Nokai Canyon and the San
Juan, though we couldnt see all of the = mile route we would have to walk.
We left Dennys truck on the cliff top where we could see the river below.
The drive back was uneventful, and we found our three boat riggers dozing in
the shade at Fatt Falls. The shuttle took about 3 hours.

We pushed off from shore and all paddled to the base of the falls. Very
impressive, and Im sure some steep creek kayakers will have fun running the
falls one of these days. From here we paddled on downstream. Were we the
first party of paddlers to float a flowing San Juan here in 40 years since
the closing of Glen Canyon Dam in 1963? We didnt much care, as the sound of
a rapid greeted our ears right around the corner.

I had the fortune to scout this area by air 6 weeks earlier, flying over
this section of the San Juan with Brad Ransom in his small Cessna. The
photos I had taken from the air had shown one area of possible concern, and
this was it. We all paddled to river left, parked the boats, and walked
downstream to check out the rapid. It was a 2 foot drop, again caused by a
sandstone shelf stretching clear across the river. Denny ran it right down
the middle, and as we 4 watched, we realized the river was a bit more
shallow than we anticipated. Denny ground to a brief halt on a small
submerged rock, then he was through. Hazel and I ran left, while Rick and
Kate ran far right. Another few hundred cfs and this rapid should be no
trouble at all.

Below here, the river channel made its way around the northern end of
Monitor Butte, sometimes being squeezed by 15 foot high silt banks,
sometimes running in a wider channel through low silt banks only a few feet
high. New vegetation was everywhere, tamarisk, willow and cottonwood. Great
blue herons glided overhead in the still air of a blue late summer sky. The
current moved along nicely at 3 to 4 miles an hour. We took an occasional
swim as we floated along. Nokai Dome appeared to the north, and Hazel and I
were able to look up at the top of the dome from the river, where only a few
weeks earlier we had been on top of the dome looking south down onto the
river.

It took us three and a half hours to float the 11 miles to Nokai Canyon. We
rounded the last corner and there was Dennys truck, up on the cliff top. We
pulled the inflatables to shore at the confluence of Nokai Canyon. A small
trickle of water flowed along the sandy wash bottom. We walked gingerly
across the sandy wash, our weight just barely supported by the soft sand and
mud. Twenty yards up Nokai Canyon we climbed up an 8 foot high silt bank
onto a low bench of sediment. We then walked another 20 yards along and
climbed up another 20 feet of silt bank onto the top of a broad silt bench
covered with tamarisk. We walked from here a couple of hundred yards south
to the break in the cliff and up to the truck, taking it in turns to carry
the inflatables and our gear.

We loaded up the truck and looked wistfully at the San Juan, flowing off to
the west toward the start of the Great Bend, where the San Juan braids into
the receding waters of the reservoir. With a small raft and enough time, one
could attempt an even longer trip down the new San Juan, from Fatt Falls to
Piute Canyon, or even across the reservoir to Wahweep Canyon by Page. That
little adventure would have to wait for some time in the future. Meanwhile,
we all counted ourselves very lucky to be able to paddle a permitless
section of river, and not see another soul or footprint.

This all wouldnt have happened without the wonderful cooperation of a bunch
of folks, including Hazel Clark, Denny Preisser, Rick and Kate. Also thanks
to Brad Crash Ransom, Dr. Tom Myers, Terry and Wanda Eilts, and Jim Fatt.
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