April 10-13, 2025

Background

In November of 2021 I was on a trip from Bass to Phantom, and we decided to walk at Tonto level instead of going up Crystal and over Shiva Saddle. We did descend the last 3 miles of Phantom Creek,  though. Having expected a typical Grand Canyon creek like Crystal, I was blown away by the sculpted narrows, high walls, and deep pools. But I was also a little chilly.

Since then, I have been dreaming of visiting Phantom Creek at a warmer time of year. I identified this as an opportunity to do the higher section of Steck’s “Crystal/Phantom Loop” that I was sad to miss last time. I’m not fond of walking on the trailless Tonto Platform we walked, which is flat and littered with prickly pear. So instead, we would enter via Hermit and use ultralight packraft gear to get to Crystal. I love Hermit Creek, and knowing how good Phantom is I figured that if Crystal was any good this would easily be the best linkup of watery canyons in the Central GC. It was finally time to find out!

Day 1

We parked at Pipe Creek Vista with just enough time to grab our stuff and catch the first bus we saw. Despite the two bus transfers we made it to Hermit and started hiking by 9am. 

It was warm, but Hermit trail has some good morning shade and we arrived at the creek for lunch. Hermit Creek has lovely narrows and spots to get wet, making it the first major attraction on this trip.

I hadn't seen the rapid in a while and to my (now more experienced) eyes it looked big but easy. I was tempted to run it, but we had already discussed the safety concerns of having a small group and minimal gear, most notably the lack of suits. Joelle and Michael had no interest, so we inflated and launched below.

The float to Boucher went well and having seen the rapid recently I was eager to run it. We pulled over on shore to have a look but again Joelle and Michael were not in favor, even of me doing it solo. So we walked the easy portage, but managed to get a 1” tear in the Supai raft. At our put-in spot was a parked river group, so we got to share a beer while applying Tyvek tape. A few of them had just run Boucher in tubes without suits, which added a little layer of disappointment for me.

At Crystal Beach we dried out and packed up in the sunshine. The Tyvek tape was flaking off already, but that was okay. I could hear some leaks in the Klymit I would also need to fix at home. Our boating setups had obvious drawbacks but they would be perfect for the rest of the trip.

As we started hiking we looked at Crystal Rapid. It's a much more intimidating rapid than Hermit because the main line leads into multiple holes large enough to flip boats of any size. But it was obvious that a small boat could hug the right shore and, with little effort, avoid much whitewater at all. 

Crystal Creek was consistently easy walking, except one short scramble up a pretty drop formed by a boulder pile. We enjoyed splashing through the water in the warm evening air. There was a flat place about 2 miles up, and at 6:45 and we decided to take it. It stayed very warm all night - I likely would've been okay without my quilt.

Day 2

We woke up leisurely and started walking upcanyon. Some sections got a little narrower than yesterday which was pretty. In general there weren't many notable features in this section, but it was very photogenic.  

At the confluence, it seemed about half of the water was coming from each canyon. We turned east up Dragon. The Tapeats produced some nice sections, featuring cottonwoods and redbuds. 

At 11:30 we reached Dragon Spring, a very distinct spring that comes out of a sidewall. Upstream from there is totally dry and has an impassable chockstone very soon, but there is a route up to the Tonto adjacent to the spring. We took a long break in the shade, loading up on water and soaking all of our clothes

After a brief traverse on the Tonto we dropped back into the Dragon watercourse and continued up for about a mile. It was hot in the sun so being wet was great. 

The side canyon leading towards Shiva Saddle was nice at first, and stayed pretty good all the way through the Redwall, which was shady and cool. 

The Supai was the killer of this climb - it's steep, sunny, and brushy -a good candidate for the worst walking of the trip. We moved quite slowly and reached Shiva Saddle at 5:45.

In one minute we walked to the east side of the saddle, and immediately found an incredible ledge near an overhang with flat camping and an expansive view dominated by Isis Temple. It was a lovely evening with comfortable shirt weather for dinner, the only annoyance being a few mosquitos.

Day 3

After waking up at 5:30 and eating a quick breakfast with an incredible sunrise view, we began descending directly from our campsite. The upper Supai layers are passable only in a distinct fault ravine that provides fine walking on large talus. The southeast side is the drier side of this saddle, so we were looking forward to dramatically less brush.

Before long, we reached a steep drop of about 30ft. Michael scouted and said he would feel comfortable downclimbing, but I didn’t think Joelle would like it. Recalling the Steck guidebook instructions to “go up if you can, go right if you can’t”, I knew the same would apply to us. We went right. 

Soon Michael found another steep drop that he was able to descend by walking a committing 5th class ledge with 20ft of exposure. Not Joelle’s cup of tea, but he was excited about it so we let him go and continued right.

This region was one of few places in the Grand Canyon to receive Lidar elevation data in a recent Caltopo update. With this new precision, I was able to use slope angle shading to identify a crumbled section of the lower Supai cliffs about ¼ mile to the right. We headed directly there and found easy passage not requiring hands. Meanwhile, Michael contoured below on top of the Redwall, putting in much more effort to cross numerous gullies and arriving at our destination at the same time as us.

Our “destination” was a drainage leading to steep Redwall pouroffs that we knew we couldn’t descend. So we traversed slightly more right, searching for a sign that we were at the top of the route. This section is usually climbed from below where it is more obvious, and descended only after doing so, so I was worried about our ability to find it.

I stopped for a moment, looked around, and spotted a cairn in a juniper. I immediately recalled reading about this in an old TR, so I investigated and found more cairns leading into a small gully. We descended this pleasant drainage for about 100 vert, then followed cairns to the right to find the iconic ledge.

Steck described this ledge as feeling like a highway, except for one spot, and we agreed. The “spot” was truly exposed 4th class, requiring easy but precise footing with big solid handholds. Joelle didn’t like it, but with detailed instruction from Michael (who is a certified rock guide!) she made it across without her backpack.

At the end of the ledge we arrived at the first of two vertical drops. I say vertical not in the true 90-degree sense, but to mean that we went down and not across. Michael and I agreed these are 5.2 and downclimbed both. Joelle decided that was far too scary so she rappelled, which was no problem since we had planned on this and brought gear. Tree webbing anchors were already in place. There is lots of loose scree around here so it was nice that Michael had a helmet, since he went down first.

My rope was a static 70ft and it was the perfect length to double strand the first drop. The lower cliff is the same size, but the nearest tree is much higher so even a single strand was not long enough. I extended the anchor with my 15ft of webbing and that was enough. Once Joelle was down, I dropped the rope and downclimbed. A party who all want to rappel this section will need 170ft of rope.

After the lower climb is a faint trail leading down steep, loose, garbage terrain to the canyon bottom. We arrived at noon and the change in scenery and general vibe was immediate. Just upstream I found pretty ledges, big cottonwoods, and a deep pool that appeared to be the source of the water. We stopped in a shady nook to drink and eat lunch.

As we walked downstream, the walls faded and the water was intermittent. Any trace of the old “Hippie Camp" near Outlet Canyon wasn’t obvious to me and we totally missed it. Halfway to Haunted the water increased, and the walking got pretty jungly. Haunted doubles the flow and below there the watercourse had some pretty sections of bedrock, so we were often just walking in it.

Arriving at the 3600ft campsite was delightful. On my previous trip, we had spent two nights here and explored up Haunted with our layover. I think the slickrock here is incredibly aesthetic (Shinumo Quartzite, the same as Papago Canyon) and it has a great swimming hole, so I was psyched to be back. The regulations state that this contour line is the boundary of the Phantom camping zone, but we had already discussed carrying on to sleep right before the confluence with Bright Angel. We wanted to do the upcoming swims in the late afternoon warmth and then climb the South Kaibab trail in the shade of the following morning. Camping here would result in the opposite experience. 

We took a few minutes to make sure our gear was waterproofed, eat some snacks, and remove some clothing for the upcoming section of shade and swims. Anticipating our camp that night would have narrow walls, I attempted to send an inReach check-in but after 20 minutes it hadn't sent so I turned it off. Typical inReach behavior in Grand Canyon. I went for a dip in the pool and we got moving.

Shortly downstream we arrived at the entrance drop, the biggest in the entire drainage. The water splits around a chockstone and falls 30ft. Fortunately there is a bolt down to the right which usually has a section of knotted rope tied to it. I’ve started saying that the 3 miles of creek below here are “the best non-technical wet canyon I know of”, because it’s just a hiking experience. But because this drop is probably 5.9 without the handline, it’s really semi-technical. I walked up to the chockstone for a shower - I was here for the water, I intended to swim in all the cool places in fun ways.

A few optional pools led us to a mandatory one below a large boulder. I specifically remember this one being overhead when I was here last because I didn’t want to get my pack wet but had to. This time the gravel was higher and it was only thigh deep. 

As the creek thumbed through the book of supergroup layers, the walls opened up but little slides were still frequent. The walking was pleasant and we were constantly startling frogs. Every plant was bursting with green and scarlet monkeyflower dotted the banks throughout.

I’m not sure why all creeks don’t form nice narrows in the basement rock, but Phantom certainly does. It’s gorgeous polished pools are frequent for the final 1.5 miles. Many of these pools are deep enough to jump into, something I was particularly excited for on this trip.

This was one of the best days I’ve ever had in Grand Canyon. We overcame the challenges of the morning so efficiently, and had now been enjoying a paradise for hours. To be doing all of that with Joelle was amazing for me. It was 6:30 and we were within 20 minutes of where I wanted to camp, but we weren’t cold so we weren’t in a rush. From there, it would only be 10 minutes to the trail in the morning.

These are the reasons why it was so particularly devastating when the core of this trip ended with an accident, taking us from heaven to hell in a heartbeat. No more details about the route are necessary and the rest of the experience is documented in a separate accident report.