Stormy sunset over southern Utah

As we continued down Cottonwood Road after finishing the Yellow Rock hike, the clouds were continuing to build and soon we were hearing thunder.  Driving the last few miles approaching Highway 89 we could see rain falling from the clouds all around us, but only a few drops fell where we were.  Soon after reaching the highway and heading west towards Kanab, Utah we did drive through some heavier rain and also the wind got pretty fierce for a while.  Sunset was fast approaching and soon we crested a hill and were treated to an AMAZING view of the storm clouds just as the sun was going down.  I couldn't resist... I had to pull over and take some pictures :-)

Yellow Rock

The second hike we did on Easter Sunday was the hike to "Yellow Rock".  This was kind of a difficult trail to find, since there is no marked trailhead for Yellow Rock.  Once you find the trail, however, it is quite easy to follow.  Easy to follow, but not easy to hike!  The first part of the hike was a very steep hill with tight switchbacks and the trail surface was a mixture of gravel, sand and very loose rock.  We had to be extremely careful and proceed up the trail very slowly.  One false move here and it's a long tumble to the bottom!  We were super glad we stuck it out and climbed the hill, though, as once we got to the top and Yellow Rock first came into view, we knew we were in for something special. 

First off, Yellow Rock is HUGE.  Basically, the rock is sort of a solid sandstone "mountain".  The dominant color of the rock is indeed yellow, but there were so many other colors as well.  We walked around part of the base of the rock and found many fascinating lines and colors all over the place.  This ended up being one of our favorite sights of the entire trip.  What made it even more fascinating was the fact that there were thunderstorms developing slowly in the distance all afternoon, so we had incredible clouds and light throughout our time at Yellow Rock.  We spent close to a couple of hours at the rock, then decided we better head back as the storm clouds were getting closer.  The hike down the steep hill was a bit more stressful than the hike up, but we made it just fine. 

Lower Hackberry Canyon

The first of two hikes that we did on Easter Sunday was Lower Hackberry Canyon.  Similar to the Escalante River hike, this one would be mostly flat.  It turned out to be a very enjoyable hike, as the floor of the canyon had a steady flow of water and the stream bed was almost entirely sand.  The water depth averaged around 2 to 3 inches, so I actually decided to do most of the walk barefoot.  The sand and water felt great on my feet and were a welcome change to the hot, dry hikes that we've been doing up to this point.  An added bonus was that we got to hear several Canyon Wrens singing as we made our way up and down the canyon! 

Escalante River Hike

We were a little tired after our hike back up the hill from Upper Calf Creek Falls, so we decided to stop in the nearby town of Boulder for a snack.  As luck would have it, we found a nice little store that sold bagels and smoothies.  This was the perfect refreshment after our morning hike!  After that we headed a few miles down the Burr Trail to Long Canyon, which I thought might be perfect for a short bike ride.  Indeed it was, and we had a blast cruising down the canyon on our cross bikes.  Our final adventure for the day was a hike upstream along the Escalante River to Escanlante Natural Bridge and Arch.  This hike had a LOT of vegetation along the way, included some beautiful giant cottonwood trees and tons of sage.  The trail also crossed the Escalante River several times, which was fun and refreshing each time we had to cross :-) 

After about 2.5 miles we came to Escalante Natural Bridge, which was fascinating to comprehend but really not all that photogenic, since the bridge blended into the background cliff and was not standing out against the sky like some other natural bridges.  We contemplated the bridge for a while, then continued on up the trail to the arch.  The arch was awesome, certainly unlike the other arches we've seen on this trip.  This one was not very big, but it was extremely high up on top of a cliff.  The lines in the rock running down the cliff were mesmerizing, and the bottom of the cliff was lined with beautiful cottonwood trees.  After another full day of outdoor adventures, we were ready for a good meal so we headed back to the Escalante Outfitters and this time tried their calzones, which were just as good as the pizza we had last night!  This has been such an awesome trip already, I wonder what cool sights and experiences tomorrow will bring?

Upper Calf Creek Falls

Being that we had just spent 4 days and 3 nights camping along Hole in the Rock Road, we figured it was a good time to head into the town of Escalante and stay in a motel and get some nice restaurant food, a hot shower and do some laundry.  We completed all of those tasks last night, wrapping up our evening with dinner at the restaurant at Escalante Outfitters, where we had arguably the BEST pizza we've ever eaten!  No joke, their pizza was AWESOME!!!  And, we're not just saying because we had eaten nothing but camp food for 3 days ;-) 

This morning after getting a good night's rest in the motel and some yummy breakfast coffee cake from Escalante Outfitters, we headed out on our next adventure.  The first hike of the day: Upper Calf Creek Falls.  We were excited about this hike because there would be WATER!  We had been hiking mostly in sand and rock for the past 4 days, with very little water.  Indeed, Upper Calf Creek Falls was a riparian paradise!  We heard a ton of birds along this hike, and saw a lot of vegetation along the creek.  It was like a little desert oasis :-)  

The hike was fairly short, but still quite strenuous as we had to hike down a steep slickrock hill that dropped several hundred feet in elevation.  Hiking down wasn't all that difficult, but we definitely broke a sweat going back up!  Seeing the falls was definitely worth the workout, though.  The main falls was beautiful and tall, but difficult to photograph.  I had more fun photographing the small waterfalls and pools above the main falls, as they were much more photogenic.  The main falls was the most fun to just take in and view, though.  All in all, it was another wonderful hike to add to our list of beautiful honeymoon hikes :-)

Willow Gulch and Broken Bow Arch

The last hike of our adventure along Hole in the Rock Road (for this trip, anyway!) was Willow Gulch to see Broken Bow Arch.  We were both really looking forward to this hike, as the guide book described it as "having everything".  Namely, we were anxious to see what it would be like because it was supposed to have a perennial stream which meant, possibly, a lot more vegetation than what we had seen so far on our canyon hikes.  Willow Gulch certainly did not disappoint in that respect!  We saw our first real spring greenery of the trip, as the cottonwoods along the trail were just starting to pop out with their spring foliage.  It was a beautiful hike for sure! 

The trail went back and forth between going directly down the wash and traversing sandy desert between different sections of the gulch.  Our favorite sections were the ones right in the wash in the middle of the gulch, because these areas had plenty of shade and eventually, plenty of water!  It was nice to hike along a stream for a change :-)  The trees all along the way were beautiful and when we finally rounded the bend which gave us our first view of Broken Bow Arch, all we could say was "WOW!". 

We were actually starting to think we must have taken a wrong turn or something, because our guide book described the hike as being around 2 miles to the arch and we felt like we had walked 3 miles or more by the time the arch came into view.  Jessica was walking ahead of me when she rounded a bend and exclaimed "I found it!".  I was thrilled to catch up with her and see the arch up ahead, with a nice reflection of the arch in the waters of the perennial stream!  Talk about a photographer's paradise!  Jessica walked ahead again to get a closer view of the arch while I stopped to make photos of the arch and its reflection in the water.  A few minutes later I caught up with her and we had a lunch snack at the foot of the arch.  Again, the scale of it from a distance was deceiving, as the arch was positively HUGE when we got closer to it.  It must have been two to three hundred feet high!  Definitely another major highlight of our trip :-)

Sunset Arch

When we were done hiking Coyote Gulch we headed for our next planned adventure of the day, which was a sunset hike to Sunset Arch!  We had read about and seen photos of Sunset Arch in the guide book that we had and knew it was something we didn't want to miss.  The hike was described as easy but without any marked trail so we were hoping this would mean we might have it to ourselves.  Sure enough, we did!  We ended up not see a single other soul in our time to and from the arch.  It was wonderful!

As we left the Dry Fork of Coyote Gulch trailhead we turned left and continued down Hole in the Rock road until we reached 40 Mile Ridge Road, then we followed this road about 4 miles to a marked trailhead on the left.  This trailhead was for a different hike, and our book recommended hiking from there to Sunset Arch, which was in the opposite direction from the trailhead.  We instead opted to backtrack along 40 Mile Ridge Road to a spot we had seen on the way in that looked like it would make a good campsite (you can camp pretty much anywhere as long as it is an area that has already been disturbed by humans).  We found our spot and it was indeed a terrific place to camp.  After setting up our camp and relaxing for a few minutes we got our gear ready, plugged the coordinates for the arch into our GPS unit (the coordinates were provided in our guide book), and off we went across the open desert right from our campsite. 



We couldn't see the arch from our campsite, but we knew which way to go thanks to the GPS.  After walking about 3/4 of a mile across the desert we got our first glimpse of the arch, still over a quarter of a mile away.  It was fascinating to see from a distance, and we wondered just how big it would be once we got up close to it.  We kept walking towards the arch and reached the base of it a few minutes later, 1.15 miles from our campsite.  Indeed, it was much bigger than we thought it would be when viewing it from a quarter mile away!  The arch was mind-boggling, just standing there all by itself surrounded by nothing but relatively flat desert.  We spent about an hour admiring and photographing the arch, then just after sunset we headed back to our campsite, arriving just as it was starting to get really dark.  Jessica prepared a delicious meal over the camp stove then we washed up and crawled into the tent to get some much-needed rest before the next adventure which awaited us the following morning: Willow Gulch and Broken Bow Arch!