I'm Bear Grylls. Whoo!
I'm gonna show you what it takes to get out alive
from some of the most dangerous places on earth.
I've got to make it through a week of challenges
in the sort of places you wouldn't last a day
without the right survival skills.
This time I'm in the wilds of southern Utah,
where I'll be tackling treacherous canyons...
(GROANS)
..climbing down dizzying rock features...
Getting a bit tricky here.
..and pursuing the fastest of prey.
This is gonna be one crazy red rock ride.
PILOT: Copy that, and we're probably about a minute out.
Right side looks good.
This is southern Utah, known as red rock country,
after the epic landscape of the Colorado plateau.
With an average elevation of over 6,000 feet,
it's one of the highest states in the US.
Just a little higher...
Maybe we'll go taller.
Southern Utah is tough terrain -
endless slot canyons, hard rock pinnacles
and hundreds of square miles of arid desert.
It's high, dry and hostile.
Advise on our altitude.
Up here, mountain lions and black bears roam,
and lower down, deadly rattlers like the Mojave green,
one of the most venomous snakes in the US.
This is really one of the last great US wildernesses
to be explored and mapped.
It was bandit country and a hiding place
for the likes of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.
It was the Wild West at its wildest.
Hey, you know what, these conditions, we can't go with plan A.
My plan was to parachute in, but there's a problem -
a powerful crosswind that could blow me off course and onto hard rock.
But I've come up with a plan B.
Stand-by for further instructions. OK.
Guys, I'm gonna try something I've never done before.
This is going to require pinpoint accuracy from the pilot
and split-second timing from me to get right.
OK, let's do it, guys.
Let's give it a go. OK.
We've located a stretch of level ground.
We're going in.
I'll tell you what, let's check it out and take it around.
Alright.
The pilot will bring the plane down as low and slow as it will go.
And then I'm gonna lower myself out.
The plane isn't gonna stop.
As soon as I'm confident I'm gonna go for it.
But make no mistake, this is dangerous.
I'm at the mercy of the furious prop wash from the plane's engines
and terrifyingly close to the thundering rear wheel.
But I'm down and in one piece.
Smoking trousers!
Oh, fair to say that I've got one red-hot backside.
Just got completely shredded.
OK, let's get going.
I've landed high on the mighty Colorado Plateau
which covers large parts of Utah, Arizona, Colorado and New Mexico.
To the south lies the Grand Canyon
and in between, some of the wildest terrain in the US.
Wow, what a vista.
It's a long way down there.
Just a crazy landscape.
And what you get is this mix of hard and soft rock
and it creates all these totem pole-like pinnacles.
These rock hoodoos can be 10 storeys high and dangerously unstable.
See that slope over there, with all the snow on it?
It's probably gonna be north-facing - sees the least sun -
which means north is gonna be over here.
I've got my bearings and now I'm heading south to lose altitude.
Up here it's cold, with low oxygen and low humidity.
This can quickly lead to fatigue, thirst and, at night, hypothermia.
It's not that way.
Whoa, whoa, whoa.
OK, it's a bit more precarious than I thought, this.
Tightly packed.
I need to get something just to help me go down this.
Even something like this can help you.
It just gives you some leverage to push your body out from the slope.
The temptation is when it gets steep and you get scared, is you tuck in
and that's when your feet drop out from under you.
You want to be out from the slope, put your weight on it
and descend like this.
And it's just an alpine technique they use on steep snow and ice.
To be honest, this is pretty similar.
OK, come on.
This technique requires confidence and a little practice,
but ultimately it's efficient and fast.
Yeah, it's much better on the ridges here - it's softer.
Down in the gullies, that's all really compacted.
Let's keep on going down this.
At this speed I'm soon down to the next section of the descent.
Now there's loose scree underfoot.
Keep zigzagging across this.
We don't wanna be bringing a whole load of rocks on top of each other.
Follow my line.
An angled descent reduces the chance of injury from dislodged rocks.
Look, that's the last of these spires and then we're out of them.
Let's get down to the trees.
That's where we're gonna find food and water.
Pine forest like this is classic bear territory.
I've got to proceed with caution.
But it's also a rich hunting ground,
a place full of resources with everything you need to survive.
Little bits of pine resin.
There should be more.
Yeah, look, there's more up higher there.
Where branches have broken off, the tree will ooze out resin.
Try and get up to that.
In winter this area can see up to 15 feet of snow,
leading to significant damage to the lower branches of these pines.
Take a bit of that and that's gonna help with fire-lighting.
There's loads of other things you can use pine resin for -
it can act as a glue, even to seal wounds.
OK, that'll do.
Keep going.
Lower down, the pine forest gives way to parched earth territory
and with it, its own animal dangers.
There are mountain lions in this area,
and one of the dangers of them
is they're very bright but also opportunistic hunters.
Mountain lions, or cougars, are stalk-and-ambush predators.
Almost invariably whenever there have been attacks on humans
the lions approach from behind
and completely without warning, having tracked them.
And even this sort of terrain is classic for mountain lion attack,
where they can drop down and use their body weight
to pin you, go for your throat.
And a good little tip, if you've got dark glasses on -
stick them on the back of your head,
and it looks like then you've got eyes in the back of your head
and that's gonna help deter them.
But your most immediate problem here is a lack of collectible water.
Just all bone-dry, this.
Look at it.
It's a mix of clay and sand that's been made wet by the rain
and then dried out, expanded and just cracked.
But if we're gonna find water it's gonna be down.
There's no time to waste,
and this dry shale makes for a speedy descent.
But on terrain like this
there's a danger of picking up just too much speed.
(GROANS)
I'm in southern Utah, suspended 100 feet above a narrow rock canyon.
Get my foot on here. Stay up.
Whew.
Oh, I hate that feeling.
Man alive. OK, let me come back here.
That's the danger of loose sand on hard rock.
OK, let's find a way down to this.
I've spotted a stream in the canyon below.
Now I've got to find a way down to collect water.
No, that's all just sheer down there.
Might be able to work our way down this bit.
It's quite committing, though.
It's a long way to the bottom,
especially when it's all loose like this.
At first things don't look promising.
It really is a funnel of doom down there, look.
The rock is brittle and treacherous underfoot,
which means there's a real danger of slipping clean off this face.
Whoa.
It's an awkward little bit to get around.
Just out of...out of comfortable reach.
Bad consequences of falling here as well.
It's now or never. Here goes.
One step closer, but this ledge is exposed,
lying 100 feet above the canyon floor.
Look at my feet and don't look down.
Like so much of climbing, though, you don't have to rush it.
Take your time, be confident with each step.
And finally, some reward for my efforts.
Gonna chimney down behind this flake.
There's a whole gap down here.
But this descent has still got a way to go.
This rock ramp lies at 45 degrees and it's covered in dust,
making it as slippery as ice.
(COUGHS)
Gonna shift my way down this.
I've got to push against the rock with all my force
to get any sort of traction.
Jam a foot on each wall
and just push like opposing forces
and just slowly wedge my way down.
Almost doing the splits here.
I'm making progress, but this rock face doesn't get any easier.
Pretty vertical, this next bit.
One foot wedged in here, hand wedged in the crack,
and just slowly edge my way down this.
Just a few more feet and one last hand-hold and I'm down.
Whew! OK, down.
Now to collect what I came for.
The problem is a lot of this water is really silty.
Look at the colour of that.
Try and drink that straight off
and that silt and sediment could easily make you sick,
and that's just gonna dehydrate you further.
A simple way of getting rid of the sediment is just to filter it.
And you can use anything for that -
T-shirt, hat, and if you haven't got that, even your sock.
(GROANS)
Any water-permeable fabric will act like a sieve
by removing particles from the liquid,
but, ideally, even filtered water should be boiled before drinking.
Look, that's coming out nice and clear now.
Probably not gonna make it smell very nice, though.
OK, sock on and then we're on our way again.
I'm following the water downstream to lose altitude
and hopefully find a larger watercourse.
Not only got water down here but also
I've got some shade, which is nice.
Out of that beating sun.
It's also pretty easy going. Making some good progress.
But narrow, water-carved canyons
like this hold potential dangers too.
Flash floods caused by rainfall upstream
can occur any time and without warning.
I know of 12 tourists who were caught in a flash flood
in one of these slot canyons in southern Utah.
And it hadn't even been raining, and they were down in there,
and the first thing they knew,
they just got hit by this wall of
brown water full of boulders and logs
and 11 of the 12 were killed.
And the lesson is never get complacent.
Just 'cause you haven't seen rain
doesn't mean you can't be hit by flash flood.
Rain upstream will flow straight down through here,
and that's a concern.
The canyon is narrowing and the walls are getting steeper.
Now, this is the sort of place
you wouldn't want to be caught in a flash flood.
You truly have no escape route up these.
Keep moving a bit faster.
Going downstream isn't working.
There are no obvious ways out and the canyon's getting deeper.
So I'm changing direction and heading up a small side canyon.
Now I'm battling gravity and the flow of water,
and it's considerably harder work.
There's no way we're gonna get up this bit.
Keep moving up.
But I'm gaining height and the canyon walls are getting lower.
This is a possible way out.
It's just an awkward one, this.
This wet rock is super slippery and there are no good holds.
Just gotta use your knees, split them,
and use that to prise your way up.
And finally I'm out of that hole.
That's the exit of the canyon.
Safe to say we found water.
I'm in southern Utah, in the American Wild West.
I've landed high
and tackled treacherous canyons and hard rock ravines.
Now I'm moving through mixed forest and high chaparral.
Look, there's a little plantain.
See this guy?
The Plantago herb has antibacterial properties.
This stuff became known by Native Americans as white man's footprints,
'cause it grows in this compacted, sun-baked ground
and they'd often find it in the trail that the wagons would leave
as the pioneers headed west.
But good plant to take with you.
More than 60,000 Mormon pioneers
made the arduous journey west to Utah
in the mid-19th century.
The remains of an old cabin.
Some founded large settlements,
others carved out solitary
homesteads in Utah's vast wilderness.
Wow, check this out through here! Look.
Probably an old pioneer's hut.
But doesn't look like anyone's lived here for a long time.
A lot of work has gone into making this.
It's all done with hand tools.
You can tell, look - see the axe, chipping marks?
If you come across a place like this,
there's so much here for the survivor.
You know, look, even an old bit of barbed wire like that,
masses of things you can use that for.
With a bit of work, this will make a good overnight shelter.
But before that, there's food to consider.
This cabin will have been built near a water source,
a priority for any settler.
And that's gonna be a good place to look for something to eat.
Good little lake here.
And this is gonna be perfect for a bit of fishing.
Probably spring-fed.
More than likely gonna have fish in this.
Trout, bass and bluegill are native to this area.
Actually, look, there's lots of willow all along here.
Gives me an idea of how I can make a simple fish trap that I can leave
so I don't have to sit fishing myself for hours.
OK, let's use this.
Willow is great for fishing.
It's long and very flexible - bendy for a fishing rod.
And willows are generally found growing close to water.
I'm just gonna make a really simple trigger mechanism...
..for the fishing rod so I can leave it -
it's gonna be under tension -
until anything takes the bait.
The trigger requires two short wooden
arms with notches carved into them.
It's fiddly work and needs patience.
And that notch, the trigger fits in like that.
It can go under tension until anything releases it.
For fishing line I can use the inner strand from my para cord,
something I always carry with me.
It'll pull out nice and easy,
and that makes perfect fishing line.
And then for the hook,
I've got this little bit of barbed wire, found up by the cabin,
and that will do the job nicely.
And now for the delicate part of the construction.
That fits under there and that's then under tension.
I'll attach the fishing wire to that end, cast it out,
anything catches it, it dislodges this...
..and that then pulls the hook into the fish's mouth and it's caught.
OK, find some bait, and then we'll set that and we're good to go.
Lake and river banks are often teeming with life.
Had to get to his head quickly - otherwise they end up biting you.
A little garter snake just swimming through the water there.
Just spotted him.
If there's snake in here, there's probably gonna be fish as well.
But that is gonna be at least some dinner.
And snake guts make perfect fishing bait.
The line's set.
Now to head back to base and sort out bedding for the night ahead.
Really, I wanna make myself some sort of bed that's off the ground.
One of the dangers of old cabins like this,
it's gonna be a magnet for snakes,
especially under all of these floorboards.
They're looking for the same thing as me - warmth and shelter.
But with a couple of these I can get myself off the ground.
The floorboards will make for a solid
if none too comfortable bed platform.
That's gonna be wide enough there.
I can jam one end into the wall,
and I've found just the thing to suspend the other.
Actually, look, it's got a noose on the end.
Would have been a lasso, that.
Even with the resources close at hand,
this is still a tricky build.
It's one of those times when you need more than two hands.
Just get that in.
But this is a quick assembly -
a little crude, perhaps, but effective.
OK, so that's a good bed platform off the ground.
Maybe fill in some of these gaps as well,
keep any rainwater off me.
Another hitch in that to make sure this bed doesn't collapse.
And with bed and shelter sorted,
it's back to the fish trap I set two hours ago.
It has triggered...
..but the line looks quite slack.
So it might just have been the wind.
We can reset it and give it another go.
Ooh, hang on. Oh, look, we've got something.
I thought it was just slack in the wind,
but actually it was caught around all those reeds.
That's a little bass fish.
And that's a great catch.
That means I've got a snake and some fish.
So tonight, I eat.
But first I need fire.
Then we use this old trough as a fire base,
but also as a bit of a wind-guard.
Break up some of this pine resin into this tinder bundle.
The wood is dry and quickly takes a spark.
There we go.
Don't wanna smother it.
Nice dry brush on top of it.
And let it build up those three essential ingredients of a fire -
oxygen, heat and fuel.
We can just put as a frying pan on there.
While the food is cooking, a chance to put the final touches to my camp.
Get a load of this stuff as bedding.
These grasses will provide warmth and a degree of comfort.
Just gonna give me a couple of inches of insulation to sleep on.
OK, that'll do.
OK, this is gonna be done now.
Easier said than done getting it off, though.
Roasting hot pan and nicely cooked fish.
And that just looks incredible.
Good nutrition, good protein,
lots of good fats and minerals and vitamins in that.
Really good-sized meal, this,
and I didn't even have to be there to catch it.
Fresh food and the great outdoors.
There's simply nothing better.
You can see why somebody a long time ago decided to stay here
and try and make a life in this incredible landscape.
In the Wild West days, southern Utah,
a lot of it, was bandit country,
which meant outlaws would use these sort of places to hide away
for months, sometimes even years.
But to do that they needed incredible skills
to be able to live off the land.
But the difference between them and the survivor
was that their goal was to stay hidden.
The survivor's goal is to stay alive long enough to be found.
I've just spent a night in the wilds of southern Utah.
Breakfast is the small garter snake I caught at the lake.
This is a good way of cooking him - really kills any bacteria.
Been bubbling away for about 10 minutes.
That's good to eat now.
But snake is an acquired taste at the best of times.
And some people say that snake tastes like chicken,
but I don't know what sort of chicken they're eating.
It's bony, sinewy...
..and not very like chicken.
Time to get moving.
An isolated cabin is one thing,
but most of the population in this region
live at lower altitudes,
so the best chance of finding people is to head down.
But that's easier said than done in a place like this.
Careful on this edge, look. All of this is horrible.
Just breaks off.
I want to find a way off this high, windy ridge,
but I've only got the lasso rope I found at the cabin.
There's a little ledge down here.
You see that? About 40 foot down.
Probably got enough rope actually to reach that ledge with the lasso.
Otherwise it's gonna be probably
about 150 foot to the bottom of this,
which I definitely don't have enough for.
And so I can retrieve my lasso rope from the bottom,
a bit of simple ingenuity.
Short little bit of wood like that...
..round that noose of the lasso.
And as long as the tension on the rope is running down...
..that's gonna stay there.
Time to put this to the test.
This is the awkward bit.
It's a very exposed spot and a very long way down.
First there's a difficult overhang to negotiate.
And this makes getting into position very awkward.
I need my right hand to hold onto the rock
and my left hand on this rope,
then just wrap my leg a couple of times around this.
Just gonna give me that bit more friction.
I'm starting to make some progress, but this is a challenging descent.
To make matters worse, there's a powerful crosswind.
Getting a bit trickier here, just 'cause it's steeper.
You don't want to even contemplate a fall here.
I'm almost there,
but there's one final challenge...
..my rope's running out.
And it reaches - just.
I'm on the ledge.
Just need to get this lasso back,
try and flick this thing so it pops out.
The rope is jammed, but with a final whip-crack it's away.
That worked nicely, but it only just reached.
Should be able to shuffle along this now.
Off the rope, this ledge feels so precarious,
and it's over 100 feet to the bottom.
This brittle layered rock face
is still steep and requires great caution.
Need to keep a really low centre of gravity.
Use all of your palms of your hands, soles of your feet as grip.
This technique is all about
keeping the maximum points of contact for maximum friction.
It doesn't look elegant, but it can guarantee a safe descent,
and in a situation like this, that's all that counts.
That was a good climb down - committing but good.
Now the hard rock gives way to soft sand.
This is much easier going and I can make some fast progress.
Temperatures in this high-altitude desert can break 100 degrees.
Right now it's cooler,
but in this territory water is always an issue,
and a few miles of this will burn through supplies.
So I'm on the lookout for places where rainwater might collect.
And this red slot canyon is ideal.
It's been formed by the wear of sediment-filled water
rushing through the soft southern Utah sandstone.
Around here
is the highest concentration of slot canyons anywhere in the world.
Wow! These boulders have obviously come down and got lodged there.
Just absolutely wedged.
But actually, this is the classic sort of terrain
that a climber a few years back was going through
and a boulder fell, dislodged as he was rappelling,
and actually trapped his arm - bam, pinned it.
And he was stuck in this canyon like this for five days,
and that must have been a truly horrendous situation
to have been faced with.
Aron Ralston had to decide whether to die of dehydration
or take drastic action to free himself.
But eventually... he proved himself a survivor.
He got his blunt penknife, hacked all the way through his arm,
through his bone, through the nerves, and made it out alive.
And that's called the spirit of survival.
I'm in southern Utah, making my way through a narrow slot canyon.
Look, there's water on the rock here.
Moisture coming down, a seep.
(SLURPS)
This is rainwater dripping through the rock from above.
That's nice.
Collecting it would take hours.
Instead, I take a useful hydration boost, then get on my way again.
(SKITTERING) Oh, look, rabbit!
I've spotted a rabbit ahead. This is worth a chase.
He's faster than me and quickly out of sight,
but there's only one direction he can go.
And if he hits an obstacle, I'll have him cornered.
But no joy.
The canyon's opened up and he's escaped.
He's gone.
At least he showed me a way out of that slot canyon.
(CATCHES BREATH)
Now I've entered arid scrub desert.
This is a harsh landscape,
but even here there are some useful natural resources.
There are lots of these bushes around here,
and this is Mormon tea.
And what Native Americans and Mormon settlers would do
is collect this and then boil it up to make tea,
and that would help with respiratory problems
such as hay fever, asthma.
Just take some of this.
Early settlers in southern Utah
arrived in an unmapped territory with few trails.
In this wilderness,
the best geographical signposts were often the rivers.
Can almost guarantee if you follow this
you will eventually find people.
OK, we just need to get down to it.
Let's go this way.
Wow, what a feeling.
And almost all of the rivers here
are gonna run down and meet the mighty Colorado,
and that just cuts its way across, across the Wild West.
A tributary like this should eventually lead to a town.
The majority of settlements in this desert
had to be built close to watercourses
if they were to stand any chance of surviving and prospering.
Rivers provided food,
water for humans and livestock, and irrigation,
and were used as an important route of communication
through hostile territory.
Look, you can see the river is running much faster here.
All this white water and all that flood debris as well
in the middle of the river.
The good part of that
is it means we're losing altitude and making progress.
But progress is never guaranteed down tight canyons like this.
Look - nightmare, this.
This canyon wall juts out into the river
and it doesn't look like there's a way over it or around it.
And this is gonna be a hard one to get around.
A hell of a pace of water coming down this.
It's a no-go.
Getting round the canyon wall looks seriously dangerous.
I'm gonna head back upstream and try to locate a safer crossing point.
Might be able to use this series of boulders here to get across.
Let's try this. Come on.
There's a fallen tree across to a large rock that looks promising.
Yeah, this could work.
As long as the deadfall stays in place,
I can get across to the middle one.
I'm gonna give this a try and hope that this tree will hold firm.
It's a precarious spot with no protection.
Fall in here, and I'd be dragged downstream fast.
Well, we've done the first third.
Try and get to this one now and then across.
There's no safe jump across to the centre rock,
so I'm taking the long way round.
Little bit precarious, this bit.
Progress is slow, but inch by inch I'm getting there.
OK.
That's the second one.
Now to see if there's a route across to the far bank.
Was kinda hoping there'd be a few little boulders
so I could hop across.
That was so close but... I can't do it here.
Yes - no-go, no-go.
Strike two - no way across.
Back to the drawing board.
So I take to the water.
Hell of a flow on this!
Third time lucky or three strikes and out?
I'm in southern Utah, trying to cross this river,
but so far it's been no good.
No-go, no-go. Can't do it here.
My plan now is to head back to the spot where the cliff blocks my path,
then attempt to get around it through the water
and continue downstream on the bank.
But now there's an added obstruction.
The first thing is to get rid of this.
Before braving white water like this,
I want to shift this driftwood out of the way.
The last thing I want is to get snagged or pinned against it.
The amazing force of the water
rips the tree away and under the overhanging rock.
Might be a bit of "hold your breath time" round there.
To make sure I'm not swept away,
I'm gonna use my trusty lasso and tie it off to a solid anchor point.
Put a constrictor knot around this.
This is one knot I do not want to come undone.
The constrictor knot is an effective binding knot
that's simple and secure.
Absolutely locks on itself and won't come undone.
I'd trust my life to that one every time.
Now to put it to the test in this very fast-flowing water.
OK, once I'm round, I'm gonna give it two strong tugs,
and that means it's good and you follow.
The lasso here is a lifeline.
An uncontrolled descent through waters like these
risks serious injury or death.
I'm holding myself out of the main stream
for as long as possible...
Hell of a flow on this!
..because when the full force of the water catches me, I'm gone.
That's the signal.
Now it's the cameraman's turn.
Pretty horrible feeling when you're under the water waiting to pop up.
We're around that canyon corner and we can get moving again.
Good job, though, really good. Committing.
It's much easier going now and the canyon is widening out.
Look, that's horse poo.
Horses are a valuable resource in this part of the world,
so they're rarely left to run wild.
Where there are horses, there's a good chance of finding people.
Look, all of these are hoof prints, horses'.
Really distinct.
And they're all the way along here.
But because the sand is churned up, it's darker,
means there's still moisture in it,
which means these are quite fresh prints.
I'm gonna follow these tracks.
I also want to try and keep the hoof marks between me and the sun.
That way they cast a shadow and they're easier to follow.
Tracking is one of the great traditional arts of the Wild West.
Pick up the pace a bit.
Using these skills, Native Americans crossed great wildernesses...
Tell me that isn't fresh! Smells fresh.
..law enforcement agents tracked down fleeing outlaws
and the odd lone survivor has made it back to civilisation.
Look, up on the cliff-top.
Looks like we've got ourselves a real cowboy.
Come on.
It's the end of my Utah adventure.
I've survived the challenges
of the canyon lands and red rock country,
and now I'm heading home.
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