Megan’s Take
Today we drove about an hour and 20 minutes to the south eastern “Needles” section of Canyonlands National Park. It is not commonly visited and was much less crowded. It felt like we were in a more isolated, wilderness area driving out to it. Because of heat, time constraints, and the children’s energy level, we only hiked the Slickrock trail – about 2.5 miles, 400 ft elevation change. We got great views of the surrounding canyons, and it was really fun to hike across the slickrock.
Emilia and Emmett also enjoyed playing in “caves” while we waited for Phil to take pictures.
The rest of the day went by quickly as it always does – driving, dinner at a food truck park, laundry and swimming at the campground. I’m always amazed at how extra fast the days pass when traveling, especially when dealing with the logistics of young children. We only have about 2.5 weeks until we’re home. We miss our friends and family, but we don’t quite miss home yet. I *DO* miss our washer and dryer, though.
Phil’s Take
There wasn’t as much to the day because we spent so much of it traveling, but I really enjoyed the relative isolation of the more remote section of Canyonlands National Park we visited today. The drive there was beautiful and worth the trip on its own.
The first sight we saw was Wilson Arch.
A major portion of the to the southern partt of Canyonlands National Park passes through Bears Ears National Monument, operated by the BLM. The first thing we saw on this stretch of road was the.Newspaper Rock, which has tons of petroglyphs.
Not far past Newspaper Rock was a beautiful canyon drive akin to the drive along the Colorado River we did yesterday.
After hitting up the visitor center for a pit stop, we hiked the trail as Megan mentioned. The trail afforded some pretty good views of the surrounding canyons carved by tributaries of the Colorado River, but not the Colorado River itself. I believe we’ll see that more tomorrow at the more developed northern part.
The first viewpoint gave a view of more unique rock formations of this park, things we really hadn’t seen anywhere else yet.
The second viewpoint gave more of a view of canyons, but was still a bit of a mixture. It was at this point where Megan stayed back with the kids and let them play in the caves while I went ahead and caught a more panoramic view of the surroundings. It was far too dangerous for them to go out where I did, because of the steep drop offs and gaps I had to jump just to get out to the top of the rock from which I took this panorama.
It wasn’t until the last viewpoint that you could really see major canyons. There was a spur that ran out to this vista, and at this point Emmett was super whiny and low on energy, plus the rocks were suspected to be tough to climb over, so I took the spur alone. There is a false end to the ridge where I took this panorama.
Then I noticed that there was indeed more trail that led out to the true end of the ridge right where 3 canyons met. This is where I took the most spectacular panorama from the park, in my opinion.
It was difficult to get all three canyons in this panorama, because of how the end of the ridge was shaped, but it was spectacular. It’s hard to gauge the scale here, but the canyon was easily several hundred feet deep.
Once I met back up with Megan and the kids, it wasn’t long before I had to carry Emmett. I think he was tired from too many days of hikes and not enough sleep. The goal, which we met to some degree, was to get them to bed earlier tonight and hopefully avoid these issues tomorrow. They can only do so much.
On the way back to the visitor center we caught some views that we skipped on the way in because we wanted to be at the heat. The first such view was Wooden Shoe Arch.
I think the name fits. Next we caught some views of the bluffs that were reminiscent of Arches National Park. Not as tall, but certainly similarly picturesque.
We snapped more picures on the way out of the park through Bears Ears National Monument than on the way in. I think it’s every bit as beautiful as the national park is.
I know that we missed some of the views you’re supposed to see in this part of the park, but we lacked the time and/or will to get there. The main view, the needles, can only be seen from a distance from the pictures we took and the road. In order for us to see the more up close, we would have needed to do some unpaved roads, which we haven’t had much luck with, or hike something like 10 miles. I would like to definitely see them if we come back.
As always, here is the gallery for all of today’s pictures.
