5-CANYONLANDS NATIONAL PARK

Today we went into the northern part of Canyonlands National Park. 

This park is a very large piece of real estate and we did not have time to do the entire park in one day.  One could spend several days seeing it all. Besides, we are going to drive “Jeep Roads” and that is not fast traveling by any stretch of the imagination.


Just so you know, there are well paved roads in Canyonlands from which you can see spectacular views.


I took about 125 pictures today, but although I have posted a lot of pictures, I have paired them down considerably. It was a tough task.

At one point there was a half mile hike to a large stone arch. This is accessible from off a paved road. A lot of people were already there so they got to star in my picture.


It was Shafer Trail Road that we drove today. We averaged 10 miles an hour and with good reason…the condition of the road prevented anything more.


The scenery was gorgeous everywhere you looked.

Then we were off the pavement and on “the Jeep road.”  And what a road it was!

Look closely at this picture. We drove on each of these skinny little lines. It is all part of the same road.  

The road began on top of the plateau and wound thousands of feet down. The road was single lane (with two way traffic allowed), very rough with 180 degree blind hairpin turns.

It was too bad our daughter-in-law, Leslie wasn’t with us on this drive. She would have provided the music for the trip…screaming all the way!!

Now you can understand the 10 mph average on this trip.

In this location there was a huge wall where the stone was all blue. I have no idea what causes the stone to be this color, but it was striking.

So we are driving the average 10 miles per hour and we came upon this guy ahead of us going about five. I think fear may have had something to do with his speed or lack there of.  

He finally found a slightly wider spot and let us around him.  Although we did see some cars, we were glad there weren’t a lot of them.

We often saw huge monolith boulders hanging at weird angles that made us wonder what caused them to stop their fall where they did.

This was Gooseneck Overlook.

At Musselman Arch, you are allowed to walk out on this arch.  It is about six feet wide in the middle and probably 50 or so feet long.  There is nothing but air underneath.

So this was my big opportunity to walk out on an arch, so cane and all, I carefully and slowly walked out there.

Behind where I stood on the arch was a “hole in the rock” formation.

Back on the road again and heading up out of the canyon, we came face to face with another Jeep coming toward us. We each got to the very edge of the road and made it past.  At least he was on the scary side.  It was straight down on his side.

Once again the scenery was breath-taking.

That road through the middle of the valley is one we had just traveled on when we were on the bottom of the canyon.

After driving Shafer Trail Road, we went to Dead Horse Point State Park. It is right next door. Here the roads are all paved and there are various viewpoints from which you can look down into deep canyons.

At this point we are looking over the edge at the Colorado River which flows through the middle of the canyon.

 On our way out, we headed down another dirt road that would later turn into yet another Jeep road, then connecting to a highway heading back into town. The badlands in the distance looked really neat.

The map said we were at PUCKER PASS.  They weren’t kidding. The road here was even more narrow and rock walls rose up very high on each side as the road snaked downhill. The big surprise was around the next corner.

This huge boulder was across the road with only a small opening underneath where the road was. 

This is where the puckering happens, I guess, as we held our breath. The Jeep managed to just barely squeak through the narrow opening. (I think I can hear Leslie screaming again, this time just from looking at the pictures! We love you, Les!)

Up ahead on the canyon wall is what I call, an “arch in process.” I suppose someday more rock will fall out and the arch will open up.

At this point we are back on the highway and headed back to town.  We came across “Jug Handle Arch.”

In the same area was a rock wall next to the highway with a number of petroglyphs carved into the rock. We always find these facinating and there are quite a few in this area.

“High Five” to the petroglyph, folks!

Right after the petroglyphs, there were a bunch of people learning to rock climb. We stopped and watched for a while. 

The guy on the right in the pink shorts was having a terrible time getting off the ground. I don’t know if he ever got any further than this. I wouldn't have gotten as far as he did!

We want to come back here for a longer visit at some point. We only drove nine miles on Shafer Trail Road. It took us 50 minutes. 

We want to drive the rest of it which is actually 110 miles long and takes 10-14 hours to drive. Want to come along with us on that one?

Next stop is Monument Valley.