Utah Adventure Day 8: Arches National Park, a Geologic Wonderland

BY KAREN RUBIN WITH LAINI MIRANDA AND

LEIBERMAN

Arches National Park is a fantastical place, a geologic wonderland, and being able to wake up before the sun in the Devils Garden Campground and stroll along the Devils Garden trail as the formations come alive with color, is extraordinary.

Arches’ sprawling landscape of 2,000 natural stone arches - the highest concentration of arches on the planet - plus hundreds of soaring pinnacles, massive rock fins, giant balanced rocks, coupled with its accessibility and ease of getting around (well, except for traffic and difficulty finding parking) and access (through Moab) draws hundreds of thousands of visitors each year, making it one of the most popular national parks. Indeed, Arches is so popular (and crowded) that it requires advance purchase, timed entry reservations just to enter, between April1 and October 31.

We are lucky because Laini has cleverly booked two nights at the Devils Garden campground months before our trip. The campsite reservation acts as the entry ticket and for this reason but especially because of being immersed in the landscape, this is the absolute best way to experience Arches National Park. (Devils Garden Campground is pen year-round, with 52 sites, reservations for individual sites can be made up to six months in advance; for group sites can be reserved up to year in advance, www.

nps.gov/arch)

Arches is the most touristic of all the places we have visited this trip and offers such a contrast with the wild camping and communion with ancient spirits (Bears Ears), the remote unmarked hikes (Grand Staircase-Escalante), the long meandering hikes (Capitol Reef) and our search through muck and mud to find archaeological sites (Glen Canyon).

Here, we go sightseeing for the dazzling arches that give the park its name, like the amazing Double Arch, the Windows, Landscape Arch and Delicate Arch, accessed along paved paths from parking lots, with restroom facilities.

Throughout Arches, there are formations – eroded monoliths –that inspire names, like Parade of Elephants, Petrified Dunes, Tower of Babel and Fiery Furnace, also trigger imagination. Some look so much like mudmen, we name them (we rechristen Balanced Rock “E.T.”, The

Gossips we rename “The Suffragists,” and formations that look to me as if Nefertiti and Croesus had just been turned to rock.

The most ambitious hikes in Arches National Park are to the Double O Arch (4.1 miles); the Primitive trail (2.1 miles one way, considered most difficult), and if you would do the whole Devils Garden Trail (7.8 miles, that goes to the Landscape Arch, Double O Arch, Dark Angel along a primitive trail, with narrow ledges, rock scrambling and few trail markers; be sure to take enough water— 1 liter of water per person, per hour).

We do none of these, holding out for our most ambitious hike, to Delicate Arch, for sunset but I already have my trepidations.

And, in addition to the outstanding Devils Garden Trail, from the campground (which feels luxurious to us for its restrooms and running water), you can hike the Broken Arch

Loop Trail. (Unfortunately, we don’t have time for that hike. Next time!)

For my sunrise hike, I do the easy, paved trail, rushing to get to a good position for photos, and then continue on to do more of it, going to where I see the famous Landscape Arch. After my walk through the easy part of Devils Garden Trail (it is surprising how fast the sun comes up, washing out the colors), I go back to the campsite where we have breakfast.

(Actually, we have to move from one campsite to another for our second night and Dave and Laini figure out to just put the tent with the sleeping bags and stuff on top of the Jeep and drive it over, which we do by check-out time.)

We then set out to explore Arches.

We only have one full day at Arches National Park, and it’s the end of our hiking/camping adventure, so we kind of go with the flow. We drive to the different sites, and do short hikes up to the various formations, basically doing the tourist thing.

We follow a route, starting with the Skyline Arch adjacent to Devils Garden. Dave climbs to the top of that humongous boulder that fell down (scary to contemplate). The Skyline Arch Trail is short and easy, less than a half-mile roundtrip hike from the parking lot and back. The arch itself is one of the more popular landmarks in Arches. It makes for spectacular photographs, owing to its position, literally, on the skyline. Its proximity to the Devils Garden Campground makes it a perfect hike if you arrive late in the afternoon. (We arrived too late.)

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