Utah – Arches National Park – Recreational Hiking and Sight Seeing

Location

Arches is located just North of Moab. The park receives so many visitors that on busy days the line to get into the park can end at the highway. There are warnings to not stop on the highway. Which means that you must do a drive-by if there is not enough room to get your car into the entrance road. The entrance road is rather long. On the day that we went to the park, it wasn’t too busy and they had two gates open that were processing cars rather fast. If you’re planning a trip to see Arches you should stay in Moab and see Canyonlands as well. Both parks accept the national park pass, which will pay for itself if you spend any time in the four-corners region of the U.S. From Moab you can drive to Mesa Verde and National Bridges. If you’re up for a serious drive, you can drive to the Grand Canyon from here.

Description

Arches National park is a very big park. We went on the 8th of July, 2016. It was 102 degrees outside. It was dry, but it still felt like an oven. After we passed the entrance gate, there is a winding road that goes right up the cliff-side. At night you can see headlights that look like they are coming out of the sky. Those are cars full of people who’s legs are very tired. Several pull-offs allow you to stop along the road and take pictures:

Once you reach the top, the road flattens out and you are surrounded by red rock.

The first major pull-off is called Park Avenue.

This is the view of the valley of the lookout. The hiking trail goes up the middle.

The next lookout is the La Sal Mountains viewpoint.

The Courthouse Towers viewpoint:

Petrified Sand Dunes:

Next up, balanced rock:

At this stop, you can park and walk around the balanced rock.

There are pathways leading to various parts of this section.

Next is the garden of Eden:

Next up, The Windows:

This is the double-arch (left side). This is across from the windows. The parking lot is between the two groups of arches.

There are some short trails that lead up to the windows.

The trails are so short you don’t need any special gear.

This is the path leading up to the turret arch.

The view from the turret arch is really good.

After we hiked back from the windows, we hiked over to the double arch.

There is a trail leading to the double arch.

Numerous caves surround the double arch.

There are a lot of tourists at this park and this was on a weekday. On weekends in the summer, it’s impossible to find a parking spot at the sights.

This is the trail back to the parking lot.

Salt Valley:

Delicate Arch:

This is the trail to the upper and lower viewpoints.

This is full-zoom from the lower viewpoint.

Here is the trail to the upper viewpoint.

This is not a long trail, but it is quite the climb.

This is with full-zoom. As you can tell by the people walking around the arch, there is another trail that leads to the arch. It is a more difficult trail that we chose not to pursue in the 102 degree heat. We had only one day to see this park and we need to save our energy for the last arches in the back of the park.

Here’s the trailhead that takes you up to the arch.

Fiery Furnace:

The Sand Dune and Broken Arch trail:

Skyline Arch:

There is a trail that leads to the arch.

The rock that fell out of the arch forms a pile at the bottom of the cliff.

Devils Garden:

This is the trail that we were saving our energy for. Landscape arch is very thin and there are predictions that it will not last very long. We wanted to make sure we saw it before it collapses.

You can see the landscape arch ahead. It’s very thin.

This was the end of our hike. After walking through the sand and rocks to the landscape arch, we didn’t have the energy to hike to the double-o, dark angel or private arch.