utah

Hiking The Wave

The Wave is one of those places where you see photos and wonder if it’s AI or so Photoshopped, it can’t possibly look like that in real life. It looks like a different planet.

It’s also one of the hardest places to hike to… and I’m not talking about the hike itself. You need a permit to hike there, and the Bureau of Land Management limits permits to 64 people each day. That’s it. Permits are distributed through an online lottery with some being chosen four months in advance and the rest the day before. Also, you pay a fee to enter the lottery, even if you don’t get a permit.

It’s the only legal lottery in Utah!!

My friend Sumitra (whom I met on this backpacking trip) had been applying for permits off-and-on for about ten years when she finally scored one a few months ago.

I was so honored that she thought of me when she scored this elusive permit. Even though my kids are busy with comp soccer and track and field right now, my husband made it work so I could sneak away for two nights down to Kanab for this likely once-in-a-lifetime hike.

I drove down to Kanab on a Monday morning and took my time. I listened to podcasts and bought car snacks that I didn’t have to share. I met up with Sumitra, Nancy, and Sue. They flew in from Indianapolis and had spent the weekend in Las Vegas. We explored Moqui Cave. The cave has a fascinating history, but it was very touristy and gimmicky. Thankfully, it was only $7. Any more and I don’t think it would have been worth it.

We ate dinner at Wild Thyme Grill where the food was pricey but delicious. I had three shrimp tacos with a nice slaw. We called it a night early because we planned to head out to the trailhead before 5am.

I barely got any sleep that night. I struggle to fall asleep when I know I have to be up early, so it wasn’t a huge surprise. Whatever.

It was about an hour’s drive to the Wire Pass Trailhead. The road getting there is dirt and clay and apparently almost impassable when it’s wet and your vehicle doesn’t have 4WD. Thankfully, it was dry.

We hit the trail just as the sun was peeking above the horizon and enjoyed a lovely 3-ish miles through sand and slick rock to The Wave. The trail is marked only in a few spots, so having a map with GPS is really important on this hike. Apparently, some people end up not finding The Wave at all. Thankfully, all of us had maps downloaded on our phones and Sumitra had a printed map that included photos of some rock formations that helped us know that we were going the right way.

The views along the way were expansive and epic.

Oooh! A puddle! <—- literally what I said.

We got to The Wave by about 7am and wow.

This puddle made for some awesome reflections.

You can see Top Rock Arch at the top of this photo.

We wandered around a bit taking photos and checking out the area from different angles.

Sue, Nancy, and Sumitra continued hiking up to find a few other landmarks like Top Rock Arch, Melody Arch, and The Alcove. I wasn’t feeling great, so I opted to hang out in the shade and take photos. I wasn’t sure if I hadn’t had enough to eat or if I was just feeling off because of lack of sleep. I made sure to eat (Uncrustables FTW) and included something salty and sweet.

We hung around the area for a few hours and then went back to check out The Wave around noon with minimal shadows. It REALLY made a difference!

We saw less than a dozen people the whole day.

After enjoying a snack break we started heading back to the trailhead. It took a few miles before I figured out why I wasn’t feeling well, it was my electrolytes! I was eating and drinking plenty, and one of my bottles had Liquid IV in it, but it wasn’t enough salt. I had to stop a few times because I was starting to feel woozy. Of course there was no shade and it was about 90°F. I knew it wasn’t dehydration because I was still sweating and my nose was even running. But any uphill sections killed me and I had to stop. Nancy offered me some electrolyte gels and I felt better within 10 minutes. I’m definitely adding those to my hiking pack now.

We got back to our hotels, showered, and met up for dinner at Peekaboo Canyon Wood Fired Kitchen in Kanab. The food was all vegetarian and delicious. I had a wonderful margarita that further replaced my electrolytes along with a pizza that had pears, gorgonzola, arugula, sage, and roasted pepitas. We ate outside, under their awnings, and it rained on us for about five minutes. It was kind of awesome.

I explored a little bit of Kanab the next day, looking for souvenirs. I wanted a Christmas ornament for The Wave and I picked up some postcards. We often send postcards to family members when we travel. This time, I sent them from my kids and wrote, “Mom went on this awesome hike and left us at home!”

Gear:

All in all, it was a really fantastic trip. I got to do a short road trip all by myself and sleep in a hotel room for two whole nights by myself (well, I slept 1 of those nights). The area around Kanab is spectacular and I would love to come back with my family and explore some more with Kanab as a basecamp. Even my kids were jealous and they never want to hike with me anymore.

Things to see around Kanab:

The Wave (duh!), Buckskin Gulch, Peekaboo Slot Canyon, The Belly of the Dragon, Moqui Sand Caves, Toadstool Hoodoos, Willis Creek Trail, Mansard Great Diverse. Plus, it’s a 30 min drive to Coral Pink Sand Dunes State Park, 35 min to Zion National Park, and about 80 min to Bryce Canyon National Park. Lake Powell is less than an hour away and The North Rim of the Grand Canyon is only 1 hour and 45 min away.

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Wolfpack Running Club Custom Trucker

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It has been a true pleasure to build the visual brand of Wolfpack Running Club. You can see lots of the stuff I’ve created for them here. Last year I made this painting of Lone Peak in watercolor, ink, and gouache. You can see photos of the painting and a link to a timelapse video here. All of Wolfpack’s trainings and most meets meets take place around Lone Peak; which is one of the prominent peaks along the Wasatch Front. Even most of Wolfpack’s trail runs are around its base, so it was only fitting that it we put Lone Peak somewhere on our merch.

Lone Peak Wasatch Mountains Watercolor

The folks at Boco Gear did an amazing job putting my artwork on their running trucker hats. They turned out SO good! If you’re ever looking to have custom hats made, check them out. You can order as few as 50 at a time (which is rare).

The first order we placed was for 50 hats. The imposter syndrome in me was terrified that no one would buy one. They would think the artwork was shit and our small club would be stuck trying to sell these hats. Wolfpack is a nonprofit, so they are hoping to make a few bucks from these hats and not selling them not cheap. To my surprise (and relief), we sold out of them and placed a second order a few months later. Whew!

Wolfpack Running Watercolor Trucker Hat

It also helps that the hats themselves are really nice quality and comfortable to wear when running. I purposely wanted hats that could be worn by both adults and kids. The velcro tab in the back makes them easy to adjust to little heads. They aren’t the common, stiff trucker hats that are often too big for anyone who has a smaller-than-average head. Check out the Reel I posted on Wolfpack’s Instagram about why we put Lone Peak on our merch here.

I adore my hat and wear it for most of the summer.

Art in the Barn 2024

This weekend I participated again in Art in the Barn hosted by the Draper Visual Arts Foundation. It’s a fun, local show that I’ve done for three years now. I always opt to have a tent outside of the barn at Draper City Park so I can set up my own booth. Every year I consider setting in physically IN the barn, but it gets very crowded in there and it’s just not my jam.

I got to chat with some artists who I met last year and meet a few new faces too. The DVAF brought in a food truck each afternoon and there was plans to have live music playing on Saturday afternoon too. I got to chat with Stasia, a violinist who played at last year’s event. It was awesome chatting with Jacque Tietjen with High Adventure Photography and meeting Brooke Ochs, a contemporary folk artist.

This year, Utah’s summer weather got the best of us though.

On Friday, it was breezy, a little gusty, and a few scattered moments of rain. It was honestly no biggie. My tent held up just fine and my displays are heavy wood and pegboard, so nothing budged. I just had to move things around a little bit when it rained for 10 minutes at a time.

I assumed the weather kept lots of people away. There really weren’t a lot of people, but I knew that in previous years, Friday was typically slower than Saturday.

When I signed up for this show three years ago, I had wicked anxiety about it being super windy and stuff blowing over, so my husband and I built my stuff to withstand those potential winds.

Saturday proved to be different.

There was no rain, but by about 2pm, the winds were gusting horribly. I tried to stay confident that my tent and displays could handle it. I even started painting a little bit. But when one of my 7-foot-tall displays blew over and I could see the wind trying to pull tent stakes out of the ground, I cut my losses and called it quits. Thankfully, nothing was broken.

I did manage to sell a few prints and I gave away a bunch of the Delicate Arch postcards that I had made. I got to bond with a couple of awesome artists too who were my neighbors over the fun weather. Unfortunately, both of my kids had soccer games this weekend, so they couldn’t come and hang out with me and let me browse the rest of the show. So I totally missed getting to see the artwork of my friend’s daughter.

Overall, it was disappointing to have to close up early. Saturday afternoon and evening usually brings the most people. But I also understand that we can’t control the weather. Given that this was my 3rd year at this show and this was the first time the weather played chicken with us, I count myself lucky.

And let’s be honest… a little wind and rain is still WAY better than 100°!



10-Day Painting Challenge

I stumbled upon a 10-day painting challenge on Instagram co-hosted by Canvas; the company where I got my awesome desk lamp that lets me easily make time lapse videos for my socials and decided to sign up.

The challenge was hosted by Blue Pine Arts; a boutique watercolor supply company based in India, included a private Facebook group (over 600 people!) that I joined where we all shared our paintings each day and how we felt about them and the challenge. I’ve seen challenges like this a lot over the years, but 10 days felt much more doable than a 30-day or longer challenge.

When I saw this challenge, I realized that I hadn’t painted anything since March. I needed a kick in the butt to make more art, and this was it.

Now, what to paint… often the biggest challenge.

Day 1:

I started with absolutely NO idea what I wanted to paint. Thanks to Facebook memories reminding me of an awesome camping trip I took to Kents Lake in central Utah many years ago, I decided to paint that lake from a photo I took.

Honestly, I don’t like this painting at all. I felt rusty. I felt like my hands didn’t know what to do, what colors to choose, how to make the brushes do what I wanted. I kind of gritted my teeth to get it to a finished spot so I could move on. HERE you can watch the Reel I made for this one.

Kents Lake watercolor Utah

Day 2:

I opted to paint something well within my comfort zone so I could have at least one painting I knew I would be happy with. I painted a galaxy sky on a 4x6 piece of paper with some happy trees at the bottom. I limited palette to only phthalo blue, imperial purple, indigo, and white gouache for the stars. I kinda love it. You can watch a Reel of this painting HERE.

Day 3:

I tried something new on day 3. Upon seeing a handful of other paintings in the FB group I opted to try some misty mountains and trees. I have always struggled with getting wet-on-wet to do exactly what I want. Usually, I have blamed it on the dry Utah climate. One artist explained how she soaked her paper in a bathtub for a few minutes before starting her painting and all I could think of was, “why have I never tried that?!?!”

I submerged a piece of 300lb watercolor paper in a bin and let it sit for 5-ish minutes and went to town with indigo to just see what happened. After that first wash dried, I went in with varying shades of dark greens and blues to add trees and I really love how it turned out. This one was a win. You can watch the process for this painting HERE.

Day 4:

Continuing on this trend, I soaked Day 4’s paper in water too with the goal to attempt an aurora borealis. There are a few artists on SkillShare who’ve done aurora tutorials and I have never been able to get the paint to behave the same way. I honestly hate this painting and I think I have a ways to go to figure out this technique, but at least I learned a few things.

First, soaking the paper for 10 minutes helped a ton, but part of it still dried before i finished the first wash. In the future, I’m gonna try to soak the paper for longer AND paint faster.

Second, I need to choose my colors more wisely. These washes granulated a LOT more than I wanted. Granulation = that grainy separation in pigment. I think I’m good to keep the indigo, but I need to choose different blues and purples that don’t granulate as much. I know some artists love granulation. I do when I’m painting things like rocks, stone, or sand. But I don’t like it for this.

Day 4 was a learning experience, and I have no video of this because my phone filled up!!

Day 5:

I started Day 5 with the goal to paint Horseshoe Bend in Arizona from a photo I took a few years ago. Then my family was invited to spend a day at a lake with friends, so that won. I got it sketched out and some colors blocked onto the paper and left for the day.

Also on Day 5, I submerged a couple of 4x6 pieces of paper in water for 10 minutes and threw some indigo or dark green on them to see what would happen. I had zero plans for what they would be, just decided to let the art gods take the wheel.

Day 6:

I finished the painting of Horseshoe Bend. It was a little challenging to be loose with some of the texture of the sandstone and to not get nitpicky on the details. I did a lot of squinting and stepping away from this one so I didn’t overthink it. Overall, I love how it turned out and it keeps the somewhat “illustrative” style that I love to do when I paint red rock. HERE you can watch a Reel of this painting process.

Day 7:

For Day 7, I took one of the little papers I submerged in water on Day 5 and threw on some purples and pinks to see what evolved; thinking I’d do another galaxy. I ended up with what looked like pretty stormy clouds, so I added a horizon and some simple waves and voila! a moody seascape! HERE you can watch the reel I made for this one. I’m think I need to learn how to make some different waves. In hindsight, this moody sky deserved some more turbulent waves.

seascape watercolor

Day 8:

For Day 8, I started a larger painting of a part of Kanarra Falls in southern Utah. I was too ambitious with my time on this one. I got it started, but then had to take my kids to soccer and taekwondo. So Day 8 was a work-in-progress.

Day 9:

My family decided to spend the day (a Sunday) in the Uinta Mountains fishing, relaxing, and escaping the heat at home. We spent the day at Pass Lake, which is one of the many lakes along the Mirror Lake Scenic Byway in Utah. My husband and my boys did some fishing (my husband actually did catching). And I painted this little scene. It’s always fun to paint outside when the breeze makes the paint dry super fast. I was also grateful for that breeze keeping the mosquitoes away.

HERE you can watch a Reel of what I pack with in my Art Toolkit when I’m painting en plein air and the supplies I bring. Also, HERE is a reel of me painting this one.

Day 10 (and 11):

For Day 10 I finished the painting of a slot canyon in Kanarra Falls. Well, it took longer and spilled into Day 11 too, but I’m happy with how it turned out. I used watercolor, ink, and gouache.

This painting is an example of one I will probably tweak in Photoshop after scanning it. I want to lighten and adjust the saturation in a few spots to help with depth. Even when the painting part is done, I still consider a few unfinished until I can play with them on my computer. This is why I don't sell very many original paintings (maybe for the right price). We'll see if I can get it to a place where I am happy with it. HERE you can watch a Reel of this painting process.

kanarra falls watercolor

All in all I am SO happy that I signed up for this painting challenge. I needed to pull myself out of a rut and I needed to relearn how to MAKE time for myself and my painting.