I want to give a shout out to the many, many activists who take time to write letters, call Congress, attend protests, send money and do all the other work it takes to protect public lands wilderness. Because of all that hard work, the Dingell Natural Resources Act of 2019 included the Emery County Land Bill which, among other things, added 663,000 acres in Utah’s San Rafael Swell to the National Wilderness Preservation System.
This particular wilderness victory feels especially personal to me because the newly designated Muddy Creek Wilderness Area is one of my favorite places. Muddy Creek lives up to its name. When my kids were little I used to sit all day by the creek while they gleefully coated themselves with the Greatest Mud on Earth.
In the past, nearly every time I went to Muddy Creek, I’d encounter motor vehicles stuck in the mud. For many years, Emery County put Muddy Creek on maps as a jeep road encouraging vehicles to drive down the creek bed through the water and mud. Muddy Creek became a poster-child for inappropriate RS2477 road claims (i.e. a state-owned “highway” right of way crossing federal land). The misleading maps waylaid people who thought they could drive in a loop from Goblin Valley through the Swell. They were chagrined to find out they’d have to backtrack 30 miles since the last five miles of “road” were usually wet and impassible. Now that Muddy Creek is an official Wilderness Area, stuck jeeps shouldn’t be a problem any more.
In order to celebrate Muddy Creek’s new Wilderness status, I went backpacking there with another wilderness-loving friend and our teenagers. From our camp, we did a day hike up to “The Chute” where the canyon narrows between dramatically high rock walls. This is the sweet spot of Muddy Creek, the place that all the guidebooks show in photos. The creek was hopping with little brown frogs, but the canyon was so quiet you could hear the whoosh of air under ravens’ wings.
Amy
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