Canyonlands NP, UT - Apr 12, 2025

Day Five - Apr 12, 2025

Island In The Sky, Canyonlands

Tonight's Lodging: Willow Flat Campground, site 8

Today's Weather: 69 and very, very windy

High Point: We gotta say Shafer Trail, but dinosaur tracks are a very close second

Low Point: The increasing layer of sand the wind is depositing in our palace

Touristic Events: Shafer Trail, White Rim Road, Dinosaur Stomping Ground

Travel Tip: Buying local trail guides can lead to fossilized dinosaur tracks

Miles By Automobile: 88

Miles By Foot: 7

Daily Didactic

Just a spectacular day. Propelled by another early morning rising, we were breakfasting a little after 7:00 am. We’ll probably never be morning people, but we’ll take it when it feels good.

We were on the road by 8:30 to execute our first national parks backroad permit, for a drive down the confusingly named “Shafer Trail” on to the White Rim road. We’ve looked down at this trail/road from the overlook for a couple of years. It looks terrifying.

Backing up, one of the things we love about this part of Canyonlands is that there are so many trails where someone on the valley floor years ago looked up at a mesa atop a sheer cliff and said, “I’ll bet we can get up that.” This road is that. But, we spoke to a ranger at the backcountry desk yesterday who said our rental Toyota 4Runner would be excellent for this and promptly got a permit. In fairness, she didn’t know it was a rental.

At 8:45 we drove off the edge of the mesa for what is without a doubt our new favorite road. A very steep, very narrow, don’t twitch kind of favorite road. At the bottom of the descent, we followed the White Rim Road to visit a spectacular gooseneck of the Colorado River and the impressive Musselman Arch. A little giddy, we climbed back up the Shafer Trail and found ourselves with a whole afternoon left to spend.

The weather today was increasingly windy and overcast, so we took advantage and headed back to find the Dinosaur Stomping grounds trailhead. Practice made perfect and an hour and a half later we were standing amidst fossilized dinosaur tracks. Absolutely ridiculous. Feeling accomplished, we drove home and retreated from the wind storm to our expeditionary tent. We snacked, napped, and peaked out only to make a freeze dried dinner before calling it an early day.