Sqeezing Through the Tight Spot Once More: Hiking The Slot at Anza Borrego State Park

The Slot

 

Date: November 22, 2023
Place: Anza Borrego State Park, Borrego Springs, California
Coordinates: 33.182012, -116.214109

Length: 2.8 miles
Level: moderate

Pappa Quail haven't been to Anza Borrego since 2012, and since desert bloom wasn't on our agenda for this visit, he wanted to revisit some of the trails that we've hiked then. I had visited Anza Borrego on the previous spring but then I did focus on the desert super bloom and hiked where the bloom was, so I too was happy to revisit some of the fun trails I remembered from our 2012 trip. 

We arrived at Anza Borrego in the afternoon, after a fairly dry and somewhat disappointing (birding-wise) visit at the Sonny Bono National Wildlife Refuge in the south of Salton Sea. We had enough day light hours left for a short hike and Pappa Quail suggested that we'd hike The Slot. We all agreed immediately - we all remembered fondly that hike as being much fun and not difficult at all. It was easy to find the coordinates - I had published them here on my blog post of our 2012 hike.  

Even before going on the dirt road that leads to The Slot the elder chika found a bird and asked that we'd stop to take a photo. 

House Finch (before the hike)

When we arrived at the small parking area of The Slot we saw that we weren't alone there - a number of cars were already parking there. We found a spot, parked, and looked around. The area was of low hills with disperse vegetation comprised of mostly creosote and ocotillo bushes, and dry grasses. The canyon itself wasn't visible from the parking area.

At the trailhead

The trailhead wasn't marked very clearly and our memory of the hike 11 years ago didn't kick in yet so we did a little scouting upstream before we found where to descend into the slot canyon. We encountered a few other hikers who seemed at loss as to where they should be going. 

Our hike as captured by my GPS

 Going down into the slot canyon meant going into early dusk. It was about 4 pm when we started our hike and the late afternoon sun no longer penetrated the canyon bottom. 

In places at the higher part of The Slot the canyon opened up a bit to let more sunshine in. A desert holly growing on the south-facing slope shone brightly in the light like the biblical burning bush. No, I did not hear any voices coming out of it. 

Desert Holly, Atriplex hymenelytra

Very quickly we were engulfed by the canyon, as the rock walls closed in and towered over us. Not too high at first - the band of bright blue sky was still wide enough above us, and there was plenty of light yet to see the fine details of the layered rock sediments through which the canyon was cut.

The Slot

I am by no means a geology specialist, but rock formations and geological processes have always fascinated me. One of the joys of hiking in the desert is in seeing the earth naked - her rocky bones uncovered with continuous vegetation cover, her bones rugged and sharp, not softened and rounded by frequent precipitation and runoff.

Rock coloration

The trail isn't designated as a one-way. I intended to hike it in the uphill direction as usually I consider it easier, but in our initial confusion as to where to get into the canyon we ended up hiking it in the downstream direction. Most other hikers we saw there also did it in the same direction as us, but we did encounter a few who were going uphill. In the beginning it was possible to simply squeeze to the walls and let each other pass through, but further down the canyon the narrow places were narrower and more frequent. Encountering other hikers meant looking for a place to step aside momentarily, or getting really really close in order to allow the others to pass.

The Slot

Nearly all the walk through The Slot was easy, and we moved fairly quickly down the path on the fine gravel of the dry wash bed. If it wasn't for the late hour I would have liked to slow down a bit and enjoy more the time inside this pretty canyon. In one place though, we encountered a large boulder that blocked the path. We had to go around it, then descend from the ledge it formed, which was as high as an average person. Some of us jumped down, others lowered themselves slowly to the pot where it felt more comfortable to let go and drop to the bottom. Either way, it didn't slow us down much.

A more serious point of concern (not really) was the narrowest part of The Slot, where we needed to really squeeze ourselves sideways. We all passed through successfully, although the elder chika's camera got dinged a bit from hitting the rock.

Pappa Quail passing through The Slot (posted with his permission)

Further downstream the canyon became much deeper, and the strip of sky thinned and dimmed. Now it truly felt as if we were walking through a tunnel. I looked warily at a column of rock that split off the south wall of the canyon and leaned precariously on the north wall. I hoped it wouldn't succumb to gravity while we walked underneath it.

The Slot

At home I compared the photos I took on this hike with the photos I took on that same trail 11 years before that. That leaning pillar wasn't there then, it was a newer erosion outcome. On the other hand, a large boulder that was resting above the slot in 2012 has since then found its way down to the canyon bottom. It might have been the very same boulder that blocked our path earlier, or that it had since washed down the canyon, falling apart on its way.

The Slot

Almost without noticing, we passed through the narrow part of the canyon. The Slot has widened. A little at first, then more. We could now walk all of us abreast. The sun was lower now too, but enough light could penetrate the canyon depth and I could see better the intricate erosion patterns on the rock walls. I called my young chika and together we named the figures that came up in our imagination when we looked at these patterns.

Stone people figures marching down the rock wall

The sun was on its way to set but the moon was already high in the sky. At the waxing gibbous phase, the moon was nicely visible against the deep blue of the clear desert sky.

There were no plants in the narrow, slot part of the canyon because of the low illumination and the occasional flash flood that would erode rocks and uproot plants. In the wider part of the canyon had also more room for vegetation.

Plants have established themselves mainly in the quieter, lass flood-affected sides of the canyon, secure between less mobile and prone to tumbling rocks. Some of them were even blooming.

Emory Rock Daisy, Perityle emoryii

I saw there one of my all time favorite desert bushes - the desert holly. It's little red buds looked very pretty against the plant's gray, furry leaves.

Desert Holly, Atriplex hymenelytra

The trail continued near the north side of the canyon for some distance, and followed the curve when the canyon itself turned north. The rock formations of the canyon sides were now less approachable, but no less interesting. Still I saw some nice erosion formations near the trail.

Rock knob

The canyon widened even more, and the lowering sun lit the eastern walls. We picked up our pace figuring there wasn't much daylight left.

When we neared the place where we would exit the canyon the chikas asked fora break. A wide dirt road descended from the west side of the wash and continued north in the wash in the downstream direction, which was north. A few concrete cubes separated the road from the wash upstream of the road - blocking vehicles from entering The Slot part of the wash. These concrete cubes were of perfect size to sit on, so we did.

Pappa Quail and the elder chika didn't stay sitting for long - there were birds hopping in and on the bushes nearby, enjoying the last moments of direct sunlight to reach the wash bed that day.

Rock Wren

These little birds are right at home in the arid desert habitat. Their colors were perfect to blend them in with their surroundings, giving them the camouflage they needed to avoid predators. Except when they make themselves conspicuous, of course.

Brewer's Sparrow

While my family borders were trying to get the best photos of the little desert birds, I enjoyed the colorful sediment layers that were visible in the western wall of the wash. When we hiked this trail 11 years before we were joined by another family whom we met at the Palm Canyon Oasis and made friends with the day before. On that hike one of their kids asked me a riddle - which stones were older: those embedded in the top sediment layer or those in the bottom? I admit I flanked that riddle, saying naively that the bottom stones were older. It is, of course, the opposite, because the top layer was deposited later, therefore the stones embedded in it were dislodged from an older bedrock somewhere upstream,

I returned my attention to the local wildlife, the anthill that my young chika found and asked that I'd photograph for her.

Ants

We watched the sun disappear below the west wall of the wash. It wasn't the official sunset yet but it sure felt like it. We got up and continued toward the dirt road that would lead us up and out of the canyon.

The road west cut straight up the steep hill. It looked pretty steep for vehicles but the road looked like it was being in regular use of OHVs and Pappa Quail said that even our car could do it. I thought to myself that I'd rather not be the one to try this. I sign posted at the bottom of that slope said that this road was one way - people were allowed to drive it downhill only. We weren't about to drive it at all, be were going up on foot.

Uphill Road

All the way up I was worried that a car would come charging down the slope> Thankfully, none did. There were a few plants growing on the slope near the road - mostly plants I've seen earlier on the hike, but some others too.

Indigo Bush, Psorothamnus emoryi

\on the way up I paused a few time to take photos of the view. I feared that by the time I'd reach the height of the ascend the sun will have already set and the pretty illumination would be gone. I remembered the large slab of 'Swiss cheese' rock layering the opposite slope. It looked the same as it did a decade ago.

Surprisingly it was the young chika who reached the top first. This steep uphill part wasn't long but it did get all of us panting.

At the top of the ascent was a small parking area, empty of cars. The place was already under the shade of the evening but the east was still lit with the red evening light. The view was much wider from the top and the large wash that The Slot spilled into was huge.

We started back south on the dirt road and were able to catch the last sunlit patch of the trail. Cholla cacti were glowing in the sunset light, which made each of their thorn very visible.

Rock Horn Cholla, Cylindropuntia acanthocarpa

Beautifully lighted in the sunset were the tall and stringy Ocotillo bushes. Usually at the end of the dry season the Ocotillo are bare of leaves but the past summer brought some monsoon rains and it was lovely to see at least some of the Ocotillo bushes foliaged.

Ocotillo, Fouquieria splendens ssp. splendens

 My family birders found a Say's Phoebe bird and followed it to another Ocotillo bush where it settled comfortably between the plant's thorns.

Say's Phoebe

 

The younger chika called me over to where she was - she had found yet another wildlife. Beetles might not seem as fancy and attractive as birds but they still are an important part of the local fauna.

Beetle

The trail curved a bit, bringing use close to the edge of the cliff. I stepped off the dirt road and went over to look down into The Slot, where we had passed through earlier. It looked empty - no one else was going through in this hour. 

The Slot

I raised my gaze looking over the jagged terrain above the canyon. Once again I admired the way in which the desert shares the sight of the powerful erosion force of once in a long while flash floods.

The young chika waited patiently for me until I finished looking into and over the canyon. I joined her back on the dirt road and we hurried after Pappa Quail and the elder chika, hiking the last leg of the hike under the quickly disappearing post sunset light.

The drive back to the pavement and the town of Anza Borrego we did in the dark. It was a long day and I was glad we got to hike this lovely trail before it ended. On the morrow we planned to hike the very same trail where we had met our friends from 11 years ago - the trail to the Palm Canyon Oasis.