Canyons of the Escalante | Friday – Saturday, October 9-10, 2026
Aside from a brief visit in November of 2024 so I could drive The V Road before it was supposed to be closed by the BLM, I have been wanting to get back to the Canyons of the Escalante since 2022 when that year’s trip with Jared was cut short after I got sick and headed home early. I finally made plans to go back last October, but then Diane’s brain surgery prevented me from going on our annual Southern Utah Wanderings trip for the first time in 14 years, and even though we tried to squeeze in an abbreviated trip later in the year a few times, we were never able to pull it off. After all of these delays, I suppose you could say I was very anxious to get back this year and had been looking forward to this trip for quite some time. Unfortunately, our timing couldn’t have been worse since we would be arriving at about the same time that the remnants of Tropical Storm Rachel would also be getting to the area which meant we would need to change our plans to work around the excessive rainfall and stay out of narrow canyons to avoid possible flash flooding.
Although I was initially planning for us to spend the first half of the week hiking through canyons at the far end of the Hole-in-the-Rock Road, once I saw that it was going to rain for at least the first part of the week I came up with a second set of “rain delay” plans that would keep us closer to town and on better roads. Hopefully, we would be able to head out on the Hole-in-the-Rock Road later in the week. Since the rain was not supposed to arrive until later on Saturday, we decided to start out the trip with a hike down Concretion Wash to the top of the Zebra Slot Canyon where we could go on a bit of a Sandstone Sojourn and not have to worry about flash flooding or muddy roads if we didn’t make it back before the rain began.
After leaving work on Friday afternoon I grabbed an early dinner and made my way into Utah on my way to Escalante. There seemed to be quite a few people in Capitol Reef as I drove through and then I encountered some rain as I followed Highway 12 around the edge of Boulder Mountain between Torrey and Boulder. When I reached the Haymaker Bench shortly before sunset I had just enough time to go for a short hike to some pictographs that I’ve been meaning to stop by and check out for what seems like forever!
Wandering across the sandstone of the Haymaker Bench.
Approaching the alcove with the pictographs.
Red Pictographs
Handprint Designs
Faded Panel
On my way back to the trailhead the sun came out a little and put on a light show at sunset.
Haymaker Bench Sunset
I returned to my vehicle and finished the drive to Escalante where I topped off my gas tank and then headed down the Hole-in-the-Rock Road to find a campsite for the night. I found a good site a few miles down the road that wouldn’t get muddy if it rained and let Jared know where I was so he could find me later that night. I went to bed early and fell right asleep, but I do recall waking up around 12:45am when Jared showed up and then falling right back asleep again. We both got up early on Saturday morning and drove over to the trailhead off of the Old Sheffield Road so we could start our hike into Concretion Wash at sunrise.
I’m glad we arrived early since there was a nice sunrise this morning and even a rainbow as we started our hike!
Rainbow at Sunrise
Straight Cliffs & Rainbow
Boulder Mountain Sunrise
Concretion Wash at Sunrise
Light & Rain
Of course, after the amazing light at sunrise the conditions quickly became overcast and we were a little worried they were going to stay that way…
Lucky for us, it seemed that just about every time we came across something interesting to photograph the light would come back out for a bit. We had a lot of fun taking photographs in these conditions today!
This large hoodoo offered us an amazing view over the landscape we would be exploring today!
Concretion Wash Hoodoo
We had a lot of sandstone exploring ahead of us…
The ridge above the hoodoo was catching the morning light nicely.
Here’s one last look back at the large hoodoo as we started the descent into Concretion Wash.
Concretion Wash Overview
It was cloudy out again as we followed these interesting gray and red stripes in the sandstone toward some large sand dunes.
We had to wait around a few minutes, but the light did come out again while we were near this colorful hoodoo.
Colorful Hoodoo
This patch of sandstone at the base of a large sand dune really caught my attention as we hiked by.
Sand Meets Stone
I liked this little sand dune at the edge of the wash we were following.
Concretion Wash
Concretion Wash Pothole
Concretion Wash Butte
As we got closer to the top of the Zebra Slot Canyon we started seeing tons of concretions, which are more commonly known as Moqui Marbles.
While wandering around I came upon this little off-center hoodoo.
Eventually we reached the top of the Zebra Slot Canyon, which would be our turnaround point today.
It continued to get cloudier as we started hiking back and the light would disappear for good very shortly.
Marble Racetrack
The remnants of Tropical Storm Rachel had finally arrived…
These swirls in the sandstone caught my attention as we walked by.
There was a large area of these patterns in blue/gray and red that were very interesting.
When we were about a mile or so from the trailhead the rain finally arrived and we would get soaked before we returned to our vehicles. For the next few days we would try to work some shorter hikes in around the rain.
Not quite sure how you can show us photographs of GSENM and not even mention how the Monument has been eviscerated by Trump. You constantly use Public Lands, you should be using your voice to protect them.