When a friend calls you with news that he has a permit to hike into the Wave, and then invites you to join him on that hike, you do whatever you need to do to make it happen. Such was the case in early 2009, when my buddy Jim Talaric invited me to join him and a couple other photographers on a short trip throughout the Page area. My wife was very pregnant, but she was also very understanding, and encouraged me to join the guys on what would be a whirlwind tour of several areas I’d always wanted to visit…but hadn’t.
I worked a night shift and then drove from Moab to Page, where I met up with Jim and the other guys at a restaurant just in time for breakfast. We enjoyed some camaraderie and came up with a rough plan: first, we’d convoy to White Pocket where we’d spend a day and night, then we’d head to the Wave the following day. After that, we’d split up as some of us had places to be while the remaining dudes would visit a couple more spots.
February in this area can be quite cold, as was the case during our trip. The memory foam pillow I brought was hard as a rock each night we camped, but I was so exhausted from having worked late and then drove straight through that I had no trouble sleeping. We awoke early for the hike into the Wave, following a decent trail at first, and then moving from one cairn to another over broken sandstone until arriving at the bottom of The Wave.
Though I enjoyed my time at The Wave, I found the little side canyons even more interesting to explore. After a couple of hours, we kept heading uphill to visit other locations, including this spot, unofficially named The Second Wave. Made popular by the controversial photographer Michael Fatali, the Second Wave is taffy-like sandstone feature that glows for a few minutes each evening while basking in sunset light. I and one of the other photographers decided to stay here for the sunset as the rest of our crew wisely decided to hike out in the waning light. Today, i can say that I’m glad we stayed. That evening, I wasn’t so certain.
The hike out was…interesting. There were many steep areas to scramble down, and it was dark. Very dark. We had only a small circle of light from our headlamps to illuminate the “trail”, which consisted of nothing but sparsely spaced cairns for the first two thirds of the hike out. Surprisingly, we didn’t get lost nor did we suffer any catastrophes on this section, the most difficult of the entire trail. It wasn’t until we reached the actual trail, which during the daylight is easy to follow, that we managed to get turned around.
The trail gradually descends to a wash and then climbs back out the other side a short distance to the trailhead. We realized that we had taken a wrong turn when we ended up on top of a tall cliff overlooking the wash that we needed to cross. Being dudes, it made more sense to pick our way down the cliff than to follow the ridgeline back to where it would eventually intersect the trail. By the grace of God, we managed to negotiate the cliff with only a few scrapes from the occasional missed step and subsequent gravity driven slide. We hit the wash, took a right and followed it until intersecting the trail which delivered us uneventfully to the trailhead where our buddies were kindly waiting. They shared that they had seen lights bobbing down a cliff and asked if it was us. A little bit ashamed, we answered in the affirmative. All’s well that ends well.
I had this image printed large and on canvas and it hung for four years in my gallery. I was sure that it would be a hot seller. My wife disagreed, and she was right. In the entire four years that the Edge Gallery was open, I can count on one hand the number of times we sold this print in any size. I have to wonder if all the work, blood, sweat and tears that I put into making the image clouded my judgment?