Clay Hills Camp
A stark camp at mile 80 in the Clay Hills badlands — the San Juan's final canyon gives way to eroded clay slopes and open desert before Lake Powell.
Also known as: Clay Hills Crossing Camp
Clay Hills Camp sits near mile 80 on the San Juan River, in the transitional zone where the river leaves the entrenched canyon of the lower San Juan and enters the broad, eroded clay badlands above Lake Powell. The landscape here shifts dramatically — the tight Navajo and Wingate sandstone walls of the upstream canyon give way to soft, gray-blue Morrison and Chinle Formation clay slopes that rise in barren, lunar mounds on both sides of the river. The camp occupies a sandy bench above river level on the left bank, with views across the open clay terrain to the south. This is a utilitarian camp — groups running the full San Juan from Bluff to Clay Hills Crossing often use it as a final night's stop before the takeout. The scenery is stark and strange: no cottonwoods, minimal shade, just the river cutting through ancient clay with the Henry Mountains visible to the northwest on clear days.