Young couple overdue
By Ed Hill
Deep Creek
runs from behind the Sugarloaf Cafe on Highway 74
in Nightingale down to the Desert Research Center
near Palm Desert. The upper part of the canyon is
a pleasant walk, the lower is a slot cut deep
into the rock filled with boulders and small
waterfalls. There are two large waterfalls near
the upper end of the lower part. The canyon is a
favorite haunt of Desert Bighorns who roam the
steep rocky walls.
On Sunday,
June 25th, a young couple was dropped off at the
Sugarloaf Cafe. They planned to hike down the
canyon to the Research Center. When they failed
to appear that evening, RMRU was called. I rolled
up to the cafe in the wee hours of the morning
and was told that Bernie McIlvoy, Steve Jensen
and I would go down Deep Creek looking for
tracks. Jim Fairchild and John Dew would act as
relays for us as we got deeper into the canyon.
We had no trouble finding tracks in the sandy
parts of the creek bed. We found quite a bit of
water in the creek. We hiked until 4:00 am and
bivouacked in the sand until dawn.
At first light, we were up and
tracking. We hit the first big waterfall and
could see tracks at the bottom of it. At this
time a helicopter was searching the canyon. So we
asked if we could be leap-frogged down the
canyon. We were flown to the lower end, and we
started hiking up the canyon looking for tracks.
We found nothing that looked like what we had
seen in the upper part. In this part of the
canyon we had to swim pools and swarm up small
waterfalls to make progress upstream.
Meanwhile a
team from the Hemet Search and Rescue Unit had
been went to the Desert Research Station to see
if they could find any sign of them. While they
were looking, Ted and Dianne walked up and asked
for a ride.
It turned out
that Ted and Dianne lead walked down the canyon
to the first waterfall and then hiked south over
the ridge into Coyote Canyon which is easier
going. At the mouth of Coyote Canyon, they had
gone north to the Research Station.
We were flown
out from the south rim of the canyon, and enjoyed
a good lunch at the Sugarloaf Cafe.
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