The Coveted Wave Hike
Some of you may not know about The Wave.
The Wave is an utterly now famous spot which is one of the crown jewels many a landscape photographer attempts to snag a permit for.
I didn’t know of it’s existence until but a few years back when my son Levi had expressed how much he would love to hike it.
The location was made epicly famous by your friends at Microsoft a few years back when it was a desktop screen for one of their windows operating software releases.
And for good reason. I have yet to hike somewhere like it.
To get on the trail you need a much sought after permit. The permits are NOT easy to come by.
For example, were you to look today for a permit, you would be looking at your hike being in January. The permits run 4 months out.
I had tried 3 different times to get what’s called a “last minute” online permit (much like I did with the Subway…a hike and video coming much later into September) and was refused each and every time.
After my week long visit with my cousin John Todd, I headed up to Kanab UT, the permit headquarters for the Wave Permit process.
It was quite the big deal.
They save up to 20 permits (out of only 30 allowed each day) for last minute walk up.
BUT you don’t just “walk up”. You walk up and put your name on the list, which goes in a hopper. They hold a lotto style ball lottery right there in front of everyone.
It’s really a big production.
I gladly filled out my paper work, handed it in and waited.
When I passed it to the Ranger running the show, he assigned my permit number 22.
“Ah” I thought…”Good sign…that was my number in high school basketball”.
When the fun started, I paced back and forth in the gymnasium as the crowd waited with me. There were over 100 folks present.
First number rolled out…and he thumbed across the permits…”21” he shouted.
“CRAP” I thought.
Next number rolled out…he thumbed across the papers again, this time…”64” he called.
“Not even close”
Mind you, at this point I noted the papers were linear in their placement and the 64 was a long way from the 21 pulled just moments before.
Next number rolled out.
The ranger thumbed his fingers across the papers…getting very close to where that 21 came from. He picked up the paper “22, Robert Anthony”
“YES!” as I fist pumped up in the air, somewhat startling this early morning crowd. (If you don’t know me…I can get kinda’ loud…when I am excited about something).
The crowd actually clapped for me…enthusiastically I might add. ( I was the only one to receive crowd applause…and this demonstrates how much a crowd loves enthusiasm).
At any rate, I bagged the permit. An almost unheard of beating of odds.
Ultimately they only issued 4 permits that morning out of the 20 they were holding back.
I have no idea how their system works, but that’s how it went.
I met folks on the trail that morning of the few in attendance who had been trying to get a permit for 5 years!
I hope you enjoy this hike video as much as I enjoyed making it. The hike is 8 miles round trip from the Wire Pass trailhead parking lot (which is where I parked for the Buckskin Gulch Video). Honestly, other than some walking in loose sand, it was a piece of cake for me.
