Hiking Southern Utah: Capitol Reef National Park

Trails: Hickman Bridge Trail and Grand Wash Trail
Location: Capitol Reef National Park
Difficulty: Both easy with some steep sections on Hickman Bridge Trail
Distance: Hickman Bridge Trail, two miles round trip; Grand Wash Trail, 4.5 miles round trip
Average hiking time: Hickman Bridge Trail, about 1.5 hours; Grand Wash Trail, about two to 2.5 hours
Kid-Friendly? Yes, for both hikes

Encompassing nearly a quarter-million acres, Capitol Reef National Park is one of the least crowded of Utah’s five national parks. Capitol Reef features colorful cliffs, massive domes, serpentine canyons, miles of Slickrock wilderness, and a 100-mile bulge in the Earth’s crust. The western park entrance is about 220 miles from St. George. This is the first visit for my wife Deb and I to this relatively unheralded national park.

For our first exploration of Capitol Reef, we chose two easy hikes representative of the entire area. The first, Hickman Bridge Trail, features a massive arch with a 133-foot span. The second, Grand Wash, is a 4.5-mile round trip through a spectacular, deep canyon.

The Capitol Reef area has been a homeland to people for thousands of years. Archaic hunters and gatherers migrated through the canyons. Fremont culture solidified around 500 CE, from food foraging groups to farmers of corn, beans, and squash. Petroglyphs etched in rock walls and painted pictographs remain as sacred remnants of the ancient Indians’ saga.

We left St. George and headed north on Interstate 15. About 117 miles later (the actual mileage depends upon your exact starting point), we took Exit 132 near Sulphurdale onto Interstate 70/Highway 89 going east. We stayed on Interstate 70 for 36 miles and got off via Exit 37 near Richfield. We went about one mile east on 1300 S and then turned left (north) onto Main Street.

We proceeded approximately two miles and turned right (east) onto 300 North, which becomes Highway 119. After nine miles, we turned right (south) onto Highway 24. Highway 24 is a scenic route, and much of it runs between two separate sections of Fishlake National Forest. Another 51 miles and we reached Torrey, just outside the western entrance to the park.

We entered the park for our first hike, Hickman Bridge Trail. There is a $20 park entrance fee per vehicle. We have a senior pass: Pay $80 once upon reaching the age of 62 and you can enter any national park forever for no additional fee. For all outdoor-loving younger folks reading this, reaching 62 does have its benefits.

After arriving at the park, we stayed on Highway 24 (going east) and stopped at the visitors’ center. Back on Highway 24 heading east and about two miles past the visitors’ center is a parking area on the left (north) side of the road — the signed Hickman Bridge Trailhead, elevation 5,340 feet. The parking area is large, and toilets are available. The trail parallels the Fremont River for less than a quarter of a mile, then turns north up a steep hillside. The overall elevation gain for this hike is 400 feet, and most of it is climbing this section. We entered an open area, then down into a shallow, rocky canyon. Hickman Bridge is about half a mile up the canyon.

The setting is quite impressive because the orangeish 133-foot span arch is above most of its surroundings. The canyon is mostly eroded rock formations in various colors. We explored the arch and surrounding area for a while and headed back.

Hickman Bridge Trail, an easy two-mile roundtrip hike along a sometimes-rocky trail, took us about 90 minutes at a leisurely pace with many photo stops.

We spent the night in Torrey and headed for Grand Wash Trail the next morning. This time, we took the right fork, Scenic Drive (heading south), near the visitors’ center. About 3.1 miles past the visitors’ center, we came to a signed dirt road on the left (east). The 1.2-mile dirt road leading to the trailhead is decent (low-slung vehicles beware of the ruts) and twists through an open canyon to a parking area with pit toilets.

The trailhead elevation is 5,378 feet. There is a 200-foot elevation change during the hike, but spread out over more than two miles, it is hardly noticeable.

We began on a maintained trail following the north (left) side of the wash and stayed on the main trail, which soon merged with the rock-filled streambed. The mostly white-and-orange sandstone canyon walls soon rose to around 500 feet as we navigated several sweeping bends. Approximately 1.3 miles in, we entered the “narrows” section of the canyon. At its most confined point, the canyon constricts to about 20 feet across. It’s quite impressive looking up the massive walls in a slot canyon. The final half mile gradually opened as the wash ended at the Fremont River. It took a little more than two hours to complete the easy 4.5-mile round trip through Grand Wash.

While other Utah national parks receive more visitors and press coverage, don’t assume that Capitol Reef is something to bypass. Its grandeur is comparable to the queen of Utah’s national parks, Zion National Park, and worth a visit with its many trails, varied and spectacular landscape, and some visitors — but sans massive crowds.

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