We were headed into the Grand Staircase - Escalante National Monument to hike Coyote Gulch. In order to get to Coyote Gulch one must travel forty miles down the infamous "Hole-in-the-Rock" road. The actual Hole-in-the Rock is another twenty miles past Forty Mile Ridge turnoff and is where Mormon pioneers in 1880 cut a hole in the sandstone so they could get their wagons down to the Colorado River . . . a trip that was supposed to be made in six weeks took them nearly six months to complete! You can still see the amazing feat of engineering these pioneers made in the sandstone cliffs overlooking Lake Powell if you continue on this very long washboard road . . . we did not!
We decided to break this long, dusty and arduous drive up by stopping at a few points of interest as we made the trek south of Escalante, Utah. The pictures below show two of our stops . . . Devil's Garden and Dance Hall Rock. As you can see, we enjoyed a spectacular day as we explored these unique places.
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