I first learned about Leor Pantilat the way one learns about lots of things these days: while sitting on my couch and scrolling through Instagram. As an avid hiker and backpacker with decades of mileage in the wilds of California, I recognized the general features of the images he posted鈥攖he scoured granite of the Sierra Nevada and Trinity Alps, the poppy-littered ridges of the Coast Ranges, and the fern-strewn gorges of the Santa Lucia Mountains. But the vantages themselves were unfamiliar鈥攔ugged, even otherworldly.

Pantilat never revealed where his images were taken, and he rarely appeared in them. 鈥淚 get flack sometimes,鈥� he told me on the phone. 鈥淏ut some of these places are just way too sensitive to disclose to everyone.鈥�

Years ago, Pantilat was a top-tier trail racer. For a while, he held the fastest known times on more than a dozen routes in California and Washington, including the John Muir Trail, the Lost Coast Trail, and the Sierra High Route, a grueling 200-mile traverse of the Sierra crest. Between 2008 and 2013, he won 36 of the 49 races he entered.

A typical training week consisted of 65 to 80 miles on the trail. 鈥淚t also meant that I was constantly dealing with injuries鈥擜chilles strains, IT-band soreness, you name it,鈥� Pantilat said. Then, after placing third in a 50K in 2013, he gave up the racing scene. 鈥淚 wasn鈥檛 having a whole lot of fun anymore. I felt like I was moving too quickly through all of these amazing places. I was going too fast to let it all sink in.鈥�

These days, the 38-year-old, who works as a corporate attorney in San Carlos, California, goes at a relatively slower pace, mostly off-trail, seeking out and photographing destinations far from the weekend crowds. Rather than the longest distances or the biggest climbs, he鈥檚 after elegant routes to the most out-of-the-way places on the map. 鈥淚t could be a canyon or a hanging valley, someplace that looks totally isolated,鈥� Pantilat said. He meticulously pores over maps, looking for patterns in the contour lines that indicate deep gorges, towering cliffs, ragged spires, and other severe landscapes that, to his eye, are places of scenic grandeur. 鈥淵ou can tell a lot about how beautiful a place is going to be,鈥� he said, 鈥渏ust by looking carefully at a topo map.鈥�

Several years ago, Pantilat set out to find and document as many unnamed waterfalls in central California鈥檚 Big Sur as he could. To date he has found more than 150, from small pour-offs to towering 100-foot cascades. He calls it the Big Sur Waterfall Project. Getting to many of these places requires a host of skills, from bouldering to route finding through complex terrain. It also demands supreme endurance, strength, and, occasionally, a measure of luck. It entails hours of careful preparation, research, and conversations with people who intimately know the Big Sur backcountry. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 claim to have discovered any of these waterfalls,鈥� he told me. 鈥淚ndigenous people were living, hunting, and gathering in what is today the Ventana Wilderness for millennia before us. But I don鈥檛 doubt that I鈥檓 the first person to see some of these places in a long, long time.鈥�

Against my better judgment, I asked to join him for a day. He said it was possible on one condition: that I didn鈥檛 reveal our destination. I agreed. To ease his mind鈥攐r perhaps my own鈥攁bout my ability, I mentioned that in years past I had done some strenuous canyoneering in Utah. Pantilat seemed unimpressed. 鈥淭here are ticks and leg-breaking obstacles,鈥� he said. 鈥淎 lot of the hikes are not really what most people would call fun.鈥�

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In May, Peter Jensen, an environmental coordinator for Patagonia who鈥檚 based in Salt Lake City, embarked with a colleague on a three-day backpacking trip through the Upper Paria River Canyon, a picturesque red rock canyon in southern Utah. 鈥淭he place is magical,鈥� Jensen told me. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a wilderness in the true sense of the word.鈥�

Jensen was entranced by the scenery, but dismayed by what he saw at his feet. The Upper Paria is one small piece of the more than 850,000 acres cut from the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument by Donald Trump in December 2017. For the entire 35-mile route, Jensen said the land had been badly scarred by the hoofs of grazing cattle and the waffle-iron treads of off-road vehicles. (In spite of being removed from the monument, the canyon remains a wilderness study area and therefore off limits to vehicles.) 鈥淥n almost every terrace and meander bank there were multiple vehicle tracks,鈥� Jensen said. 鈥淚n some places they were six to eight inches deep and went right through cyrptobiotic soil and cottonwood groves.鈥�

Since President Trump issued an order to shrink the Utah monument last winter, I鈥檝e heard numerous reports from local residents, hikers, activists, and land managers of flagging oversight and mounting damage to the area鈥檚 fragile landscapes and cultural sites. One local resident who wished to remain anonymous told me he spends hundreds of hours in the backcountry and has seen a notable increase in vehicle traffic on closed routes and across formerly untrammeled stretches of land, presumably by visitors 鈥渨ho think Trump's action has opened it all up for cross-country driving.鈥� Ace Kvale, a Boulder resident and photographer, concurred and said he fears the Grand Staircase is 鈥渂ecoming another Moab…People moved here to avoid that very thing.鈥� 听听听听听听听听听

Curious to see the alleged damage for myself, I contacted Colter Hoyt, a backcountry guide in Boulder. On a mid-August day punctuated by thunderstorms and flash floods, we explored a small cross-section of the lands cut from the monument by Trump鈥檚 proclamation. Near an unmarked archaeological site tucked away in a side canyon we came upon a soiled pair of underwear and a streamer of toilet paper stuffed under a pile of rocks. 鈥淛ust gross,鈥� said Hoyt. 鈥淏ut it鈥檚 the sort of thing we鈥檙e seeing everywhere now.鈥� The next day, on a vast expanse of slickrock, we watched a man and woman fill a shopping bag full of round rocks known locally as 鈥淢oqui Marbles.鈥� These iron oxide concretions form deep within the sandstone and tumble out over millennia鈥攍ike raisins liberated from a carrot cake鈥攁s the surrounding rock erodes. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a crime to take even a single one,鈥� said Hoyt. 鈥淏ut, hey, who鈥檚 looking these days?鈥� In recent months, Hoyt says he has encountered graffiti on petroglyph panels, bullet-riddled trail signs, ATV tracks in restricted areas, and heaps of garbage in the backcountry.

Some might chalk up this unfortunate state of affairs to the area鈥檚 rising popularity鈥攖he inevitable price of staggering beauty in an increasingly crowded and digitally interconnected world. In 2017, the Grand Staircase received close to a million visitors鈥攏early double the number who visited in 1996, the year of the monument鈥檚 founding. But Hoyt and other locals claim that much of the bad backcountry behavior is politically motivated, fueled by Trump鈥檚 anti-public lands policies and the rhetoric of Utah representatives Rob Bishop and Orrin Hatch, who over the years have sponsored legislation to weaken environmental protections and transfer federal lands to the states. 鈥淭here鈥檚 a growing sense around here that anything goes,鈥� said Hoyt. 鈥淭hat you can use and abuse the land because the highest officials in the country say you can.鈥�

Nicole Croft, executive director of local non-profit Grand Staircase Escalante听Partners, echoes Hoyt鈥檚 sentiments. Earlier this year, one of her colleagues hiked into an idyllic canyon called Harris Wash, where she followed a set of ATV tracks for miles through the sandy creek bed. (Vehicles are not allowed past the trailhead.) 鈥淚 couldn鈥檛 believe it,鈥� she said. Immediately following the downsizing, she said she received dozens of reports of vandalism and damage from sections of the monument cut out in the executive order. More disconcertingly, she said she received reports from areas still well within it. 鈥淚t鈥檚 as if certain members of the public are perceiving this as a major demotion of these lands.鈥�

The mounting damage is of a piece with what many locals see as the Trump administration鈥檚 larger goal of reducing federal oversight of public lands and opening them up to increased mining, drilling, and ranching. According by the Huffington Post, over twenty mining claims have been made within the boundaries of the Grand Staircase since Trump鈥檚 decree. In June, Hoyt blew the whistle on the acquisition of an abandoned copper and cobalt mine by Canadian mining outfit . The mine, known as Colt Mesa, which lies on a rough and remote dirt road some forty miles from the nearest town, had been abandoned in the 1970s because of a lack of water. 鈥淚 looked out the window and saw tire tracks, flagging and a bunch of two-by-two stakes,鈥� Hoyt said. 鈥淢y heart just sank.鈥�

Department of the Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke has denied that the decision to reduce Grand Staircase and the neighboring Bears Ears National Monument had anything to do with ranching or mining. But during a visit in May, Zinke openly touted the region鈥檚 vast coal deposits. 鈥淶inke toured the monument by helicopter,鈥� Hoyt says. 鈥淗e was carrying around a huge chunk of coal from the Kaiparowits Plateau in his truck. Don鈥檛 tell me this isn鈥檛 about mining.鈥澨�

Others see clear signs of political favoritism in the redrawn boundaries. In August, released its draft resource management plan for the Grand Staircase. One section outlined a plan to sell off roughly 1,600 acres of land within its boundaries. One of those parcels listed for 鈥渄isposal鈥� was in Johnson Canyon, a scenic area on the monument鈥檚 western border, adjacent to land owned by Utah state legislator Mike Noel. (Ryan Zinke later denied any plans to sell off land within the monument.)

鈥淎s I see it, this administration, with the help of the Utah delegation, is stealing these lands from the citizens of this country,鈥� Blake Spalding, owner of a local restaurant called Hell鈥檚 Backbone Grill, told me. Spalding is a public-lands advocate and in the local effort to protect the Grand Staircase. 鈥淭hey are not at all interested in hearing from the pro-monument business owners who live in the gateway communities around the monument.鈥�

Of course, proving that a definitive link exists between the Trump administration鈥檚 policies and recent damage to the local environment is almost impossible given the scarcity of data.听One report published by staff archaeologist Matt Zweifel, obtained by Grand Staircase Escalante Partners through a FOIA request, stated that between 2011 and 2015, there were 35 documented cases of damage or vandalism to paleontological sites across the monument.听According to听BLM听spokesperson Larry Crutchfield, based on 鈥渁necdotal鈥� information from various park staff, there has been no appreciable increase in reports of vandalism in the last ten years.

But one citizen science initiative is painting a different picture. As of early October, 374听individual reports have been filed by visitors to the Grand Staircase, ranging from 鈥渦sing live old growth trees for firewood鈥� to 鈥渃ryptobiotic soil damaged by cattle.鈥� Those reports were logged using an app called , which allows visitors to describe and pinpoint damage that they encounter using an interactive map. The most frequently reported infraction, by far, has been illegal off-road vehicle use, says Danielle Murray, policy director for the , the Durango-based non-profit that developed the app. According to Murray, the Upper Paria River Canyon corridor (where Peter Jensen encountered vehicle damage in May) has emerged as a major hotspot for illegal off-roading.

Spalding says that the uptick in damage can also be attributed to the monument鈥檚 severely diminished staff and budget, which this year is less than half of its $10.4 million 2003 allotment. 鈥淲e only have one law enforcement ranger remaining,鈥� she says. 鈥淥ur monuments are being bled dry. But if we could get funded again, things could change.鈥�

In spite of the cuts, visitation is 鈥渁ss-kickingly鈥� up, Spalding says, pointing out that the downsizing has itself served as a kind of unintended publicity for the monument. 鈥淢any of these people are wanting to come to see and experience the Grand Staircase before it鈥檚 ruined,鈥� she says. 鈥淲e鈥檙e going to fight like hell to make sure that doesn鈥檛 happen.鈥�

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