October 20, 2020

By Tim Briese

Cathedral Trail: 2.5 miles, 300’ elevation gain, 1:15 roundtrip time

Grand Wash: 3.0 miles, 300’ elevation gain, 1:05 roundtrip time

Cathedral Valley is a remote and lightly visited area of Capitol Reef National Park that is accessed by a loop drive of nearly 60 miles on a 4WD road. Teresa and I left Hanksville in the dark and headed west on Highway 24, in an effort to see early sunlight on the massive sandstone monoliths that we would encounter in Lower Cathedral Valley. Just past the village of Caineville we left the highway and headed north on the 4WD Cathedral Wash Road, and the fun began. Southeast Utah is a geological wonderland, containing an endless array of unique and colorful rocky scenery, and we were treated to a lot of it today.

an interesting multi-colored dome along the road

The road was rough in spots, but the most nerve-racking part was driving through deep sand in some places, with which I did not have a lot of experience. Fortunately we did not get stuck and stranded in this remote place. After driving nearly 20 miles we turned left onto a spur road and drove a mile to the Temple of the Sun and the Temple of the Moon, impressive 400 foot high monoliths that are one of the highlights in Cathedral Valley.

temple of the sun

temple of the moon

Nearby was the unique Glass Mountain, hardly a mountain in the standard sense, rather an interesting mound of gypsum crystals about 15 feet high.

glass mountain is at the right, and the temples of the sun and moon are beyond at the left

the gypsum crystals of glass mountain

Continuing further we stopped to see the Gypsum Sinkhole, a spot where a gypsum deposit has dissolved, creating a hole about 200 feet deep.

the gypsum sinkhole

nearby scenery

A few miles further we went for a hike on the Cathedral Trail in Upper Cathedral Valley.

a pinnacle visible along the cathedral trail

at an overlook at the end of the trail

another view from the cathedral trail

The road swung back to the south and we continued on the Hartnet Road back toward Highway 24, which was many miles away. At times we drove down dry riverbeds, at other times up and down over steep hills. We saw a few other vehicles out here today but not many. We stopped at viewpoints and took some short hikes along the way.

view from an overlook

Particularly interesting were the colorful Bentonite Hills toward the end of the drive.

a view in the bentonite hills

As we neared the highway we came to one final adventure, driving across the Fremont River. This wasn’t bad today but could be in wetter conditions.

the crossing of the fremont river

It took us close to 7 hours to do the loop drive, including our many stops. We drove west on Highway 24 through the far more commonly visited part of Capitol Reef National Park, stopping for a hike up the Grand Wash Trail to the narrowest section of the canyon and back.

on the hike in grand wash

in grand wash

a view on the drive through capitol reef national park

After the hike we headed to Escalante for the night.