Trips of Utah: Peeping from the 'Island in the Sky'!

Day Zero: A long evening drive

Day 0 Agenda

Right from the day I had booked the air tickets to SLC, for our long awaited Canyon County trip of Southern Utah, I had been an avid weather watcher!  Both of us had been checking the weather forecasts almost every day and the frequency increased , when the heat wave started baking the lives in the western states.  So I would say, we were more than prepared mentally for the 5 Day High Desert Heat odyssey for the 4^th of July weekend. 

When we got down at SLC airport at 9:05 PM (MST), we were just hoping that we would at least hit one of the 10 PM closing downtown restaurants for our dinner.  But a more than 30 min long wait at the airport rental car office made us forfeit the slightest chances.

Our Day zero plan was to drive and reach Price UT , from where we could officially flag off our road trip. The 123 mile stretch meant at least 2 hours of drive before we take a tight sleep for the night. With a quick stop at Winco foods and with a burger at a Drive through Burger King at Provo,  we made it to Price at around 12:30 AM.

Day One: Peeping from the Island in the Sky!

Water. This is what this trip was all about. May it be the presence of it, or the lack of it, the need for it, or the void of it and most significantly, the ART OF IT!  Never before I had been marveled so much about this wonderful substance, even not at the Niagara Falls!

Planning for two of the National parks on a single day might not be the greatest of the ideas. But the fact that Canyonlands National park and Arches National park are less than 30 miles apart tempted us to squeeze these into a day’s schedule.  This, we decided once we chose the ‘Island in the sky’ unit of Canyonlands, over the ‘The Needles’ unit. Even though both these Units are part of Canyonlands National park, one should keep in mind that these two units are not interconnected through roads inside the park. This means, if you are planning to visit both the units, then your only option is to take 2 separate exits from Highway 191 which makes the driving distance between the two units more than 70 miles!

Colorado River at Dead Horse Point Overlook

We chose Island in the Sky mainly because of two reasons.

      (a) Choosing Needles unit would add an additional day to our plan as it is hard to cover Arches and Needles unit in a single day.

      (b)  Most the views points at Island in the Sky unit are motorable where as there were considerable amount hikes to be done for grabbing some of the views at the Needles unit.

Our first stop of the day was at Dead horse Point State Park. Taking the exit into Route 313 at around 9 miles north of Moab UT on US 191, and then heading around 15 miles in 313 brought us near a sign post of Deadhorse point state park. Even though our destination was the Canyonlands NP, we didn't want to miss on a State park which was just within 3-4 miles reach from our main route.  We headed 3.5 miles in that road to the visitor center.

One mile further would lead to the Deadhorse point. Stepping ahead into the viewpoint in the park, we saw the first grandeur of the trip. Towering 2000 feet above the horseshoed Colorado river, this point gives one of the spectacular views of Rock-Water combination.

Along the East rim at Dead Horse Point

There are a couple of rim trails (West and East rim trails) which heads down till the visitor center. For people heading towards island in the sky, I suggest this could be one of your surprise spot!

As we headed back into 313, the day turned hotter and the temperature soared to upper 90s. Car AC was the sole savior.Within next 20 minutes we were at the gates of the Canyon lands National Park, buying the $80 National parks permit. As we had a plan of visiting all 5 NPs of Utah, this pass probably was the best deal. Heading a mile from the visitor center on the Island in the Sky road, we stopped at a viewpoint to have a view of the Shafer trail below, further 5 miles drive brought us into the Y intersection of the park. As we headed towards the Grand Point, we stopped at the Buck Canyon overlook for the first view into the terrain.

The Island and The Sky! at Buck Canyon Overlook

We realized how this place stood by its name, a huge island 1000 feet up in the sky, looking into the vast endless terrain below. ‘Mesa’  is the word used for such lands, the one where we drove and were standing right now. I haven’t often heard that word till then, but have heard a lot during the next 4 days. Island in the Sky is one such massive mesa, needing a 34 mile round trip to tour the entire mesa. Any view from the overlooks is not complete without a glance into the massive walls of the mesa that we stood.

Next, we headed towards Grand View overlook. This terrain here is different because of the view of a distant canyon with a white patched rim. It looks as if a giant dinosaur had landed its paw creating a massing crater beneath. The striped carved red walls of the canyon had a white cap over them.

Our next point was the much awaited Mesa Arch. The trail-head is close to the Y intersection of the Island Mesa. A short hike of quarter mile took us near the arch. The first sight wasn't that great. At once, I thought this was an over-hyped point. But next 50 steps towards the arch proved me wrong! As I peeped through the arch, the view across it was stunning. No wonder people choose it for a Sunrise destination.

Mesa Arch - Your photo doesn't need a frame!

I imagined how beautiful it would be to see the golden rays of morning sun striking this natural stone arch framing inside it the spectacular view of just awaking La Sal Mountains, Buck Canyon and the Monster Tower. A perfect window overlooking a perfect landscape!

With the view still freshly framed in the memory, we headed towards the other shoulder of the Y, upheaval dome. There are not much scenic points along this 5 mile route. We drove by the whale rock and had our lunch at one of the picnic shelters at upheaval dome.
We did not take the hike into the dome as we thought this 2 mile hike would eat up our day. We drove towards the park exit and joined 313 to our next destination - Arches National Park!

Day 1 Agenda