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Hiking Forum
The Ultimate Southwest Vacation includes the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument!
Stay in Mt. Carmel Jct., the heart of the parks, and visit
the treasures of the Southwest.
Mileage: Mt. Carmel Jct.
Zion Park 12 miles
Grand Staircase 9 miles
Sand Dunes 11 miles
Dixie Forest 22 miles
Cedar Breaks 45 miles
Red Canyon 47 miles
Coyote Butte 57 miles
Bryce Canyon 60 miles
North Rim 85 miles
Toroweap 90 miles
Plan your Grand Staircase- Escalante National Monument vacation
with our Utah and Arizona maps.
In these pages you will find insiders information on the best
Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument hikes. This detailed
guide includes road maps, park maps, pictures, trail beta, backpacking, history,
fees, geology, flora, fauna, campgrounds, things for kids to do and even information
on the Grand Staircase hidden treasures.
Making summer memories in Utah's national monuments. |
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Directions: East Zion to Staircase
From
Salt Lake City, travel south on I15 to U-20. Exit on U-20. Turn south on U-89
and follow U-89 to Glendale.
From Las Vegas: Travel I15 to exit 16. Follow U-9 to the south
entrance of Zion and through to the east entrance. Take U-9 for 12 miles to
Mt. Carmel Jct, where U-89 and U-9 meet. Drive north on U-89 to Glendale.
From Glendale, turn right on 300 N. (Bench Road) Follow the
graded dirt road, Skutumpah, into the Grand Staircase. Remember the Grand Staircase
is a wild and remote place. The dirt roads may be impassible when wet and there
is usually no water, services or cell phone access. Skutumpah is a backway and
should only be traveled in dry conditions. Call for road and weather information
before travel: 435.644.4680
Willis Creek is a beautiful slot canyon hike in the Grand Staircase
Escalante that the entire family can enjoy.
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Grand Staircase Escalante
The Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument is a huge chunk of public
land engulfing much of the Southwestern Utah desert. The national monument is
a 1.9 million acre (1,870,800 federal/15,000 privately
owned) oasis of mostly primitive land strewn with streams, monoliths, slot canyons and scientific treasures galore. This parcel of land dominates the rural southern
section of the state of Utah, protecting as much as two-hundred-million years
of history within its boundaries. This vast oasis provides a record
of geological, biological, paleontological and archeological data that
will be used to fill many text books in our future. The remote
and pristine Grand Staircase-Escalante has preserved a wealth of original
populations of flora, fauna, new species of dinosaurs and Ancestral Puebloan
(Anasazi) artifacts.
Eighty-Percent of Utah State Land
is administered for Public Use
The enchantment of nature is abundant in Utah, where nearly eighty-percent
of the state is land administered for public use, by federal and state agencies.
Zion National Park, Bryce Canyon, Cedar Breaks and the Grand Staircase-Escalante
share a common sanctuary in the vast desert of southern Utah. Each national treasure
has its own unique display of rock sculptures to share. The North Rim of the
Grand Canyon in the far north section of Arizona also dips its boundaries into
the geologic framework of the Grand Staircase.
Stepping onto the Grand Staircase Escalante
In the 1870s, geologist Clarence Dutton described the
Grand Staircase as a "huge
stairway ascending out of the bottom of the Grand Canyon northward with the cliff
edge of each layer forming giant steps." The steps rise 5500'
from the floor of the Grand Canyon to the edge of the jagged Paunsaugunt
Plateau at Bryce Canyon. The distinct steps are the Vermilion Cliffs, the White
Cliffs, the Gray Cliffs and the Pink Cliffs.
Grand Staircase-Escalante Roads
Pristine and remote describes the roadways within the Grand Staircase Escalante
National Monument. Highway 89 defines the southern border and Highway 12 accesses
the northern side. In addition to Highways 12 and 89, there are 959 miles of
open road in the Grand Staircase. Glendale, Utah, located on Highway 89, northeast
of Zion National Park, connects the east side of Zion to Bryce Canyon via the Glendale Bench
Road and the scenic backway, Skutumpah Road. To the north, Highway 12 connects Tropic
and Boulder, Utah. At the southern end of the monument, roads connect Kanab,
Utah and Page, Arizona. The most popular roads in the Grand Staircase are probably
Skutumpah Road accessed either by the Glendale Bench Road, near the east entrance to Zion, or
the Johnson Canyon Road near Kanab, both leading to Kodachrome Basin near Bryce
Canyon. All interior roads except for portions of the Burr Trail and Johnson
Canyon Road are unpaved and may be impassible if wet.
Boundaries of the Grand Staircase Escalante
The boundaries of Utah's Kane
County and Garfield County enclose the monument lands. Kane County claims 68%
of the monument and Garfield County holds 32%.
Grand Staircase Escalante
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