Utah Untamed

Adventures

Hikes, scenic drives, parks, and the trail of the week.

A hiker wading up the glowing orange sandstone slot canyon toward Kanarraville Falls in southern Utah, with the waterfall and aluminum stairs visible ahead.
Adventures

You Need a Permit to Hike Kanarraville Falls — Here's Everything to Know Before You Go

Kanarraville Falls is a year-round slot-canyon wade to a 20-foot waterfall south of Cedar City. The town requires an online permit, sells out weeks ahead in summer, and flew the trail's new staircase in by helicopter.
A still alpine lake reflecting granite peaks along the Mirror Lake Highway in Utah's Uinta Mountains, with lodgepole pine and wildflowers in the foreground.
Adventures

The Mirror Lake Highway: Utah's Highest Paved Escape From the Summer Heat

State Route 150 climbs out of Kamas to Bald Mountain Pass, 10,715 feet, the highest paved road in Utah. The air runs 25 to 30 degrees cooler than the valley, and it opens onto a glacier-carved basin holding more than a thousand alpine lakes.
A rock-walled hot spring pool with milky blue-green water and steam rising, set beside a small waterfall in a forested Utah canyon at golden hour.
Adventures

The Best Hot Springs in Utah: 6 Soaks, From a Hike-In Canyon Pool to a 65-Foot Geothermal Dome

The best hot springs in Utah are Fifth Water for the hike, Mystic in Monroe for the vintage-bathtub experience, Crystal in Honeyville for the mineral water and the kids, Homestead Crater for soaking inside a limestone dome, and Red Hill and Meadow for free, no-frills soaks.
A paved mountain highway winding along a narrow ridge with steep drop-offs on both sides, red rock and forested peaks stretching to the horizon in southern Utah.
Adventures

The 4 Best Scenic Drives in Utah — and Exactly What Each One Is For

Mirror Lake Highway, the Alpine Loop, the Nebo Loop, and Scenic Byway 12 climb from juniper desert into alpine country, each good for something different. Three spend most of the year buried in snow and only open from late spring into fall — here's what each drive is actually best for.
A tall waterfall pouring over a red sandstone cliff into a green pool ringed by cottonwood trees in a Utah desert canyon, with sunlight streaming down.
Adventures

The Best Waterfalls in Utah — and Which Ones Still Run When the Snow Runs Out

The best waterfalls in Utah for a dry summer are the ones that don't depend on snowmelt: Bridal Veil Falls, Lower Calf Creek Falls, and the Tropic Ditch waterfall at Bryce all run strong in July and August because springs, creeks, and an old irrigation ditch feed them, not fast-vanishing snowpack.
A steeply tilted rock wall embedded with hundreds of fossilized dinosaur bones inside a museum exhibit hall in Utah, dramatic side lighting.
Adventures

Where to See Real Dinosaurs in Utah: 6 Places You Can Visit

Utah is one of the richest dinosaur grounds on the planet, and a lot of what's here is still in the ground where it died. Six standout places show you the animals three ways: bones locked in rock, footprints pressed into ancient mud, and full skeletons under a roof.
A rockhound's hand holding a rough amber-colored topaz crystal freshly cracked from pale volcanic rock, with the hazy Thomas Range visible in the West Desert background.
Adventures

You Can Dig Up Utah's State Gem Yourself, and the Law Says You Get to Keep It

At Topaz Mountain in the West Desert, you can drive onto public land, break open a rock with a hammer, pull out Utah's official state gem, and walk away with it for free. No permit, no fee, no claim to file.
A dramatic overlook where 1,400-foot red sandstone cliffs drop straight down to the deep blue water of Flaming Gorge Reservoir on the Utah-Wyoming border.
Adventures

Flaming Gorge: Utah's Coldest, Reddest Reservoir

Flaming Gorge is a 91-mile reservoir on the Green River, wrapped in 1,400-foot red cliffs on the Utah-Wyoming border, and it's one of the best places in the state to be cold in summer. The water sits at 6,040 feet, and the river below the dam runs 40 to 60 degrees year-round.
Looking up through the towering sandstone walls of a narrow slot canyon in southern Utah, sunlight illuminating the upper rock while the canyon floor remains in cool shadow.
Adventures

Buckskin Gulch: Inside the Longest Slot Canyon on Earth — and Why You Shouldn't Hike It in Monsoon Season

Buckskin Gulch on the Utah-Arizona border is widely regarded as the longest slot canyon in the world, a continuous crack in the sandstone running 13 to 15 miles with walls up to 500 feet tall. It's also one of the most dangerous hikes in the Southwest during monsoon season.
Hikers wading upstream through the Virgin River in Zion National Park's Narrows, towering red and orange sandstone walls rising nearly a thousand feet on either side.
Adventures

The Zion Narrows: When to Go, How the River Decides, and the Danger That Shares the Season

The best time to hike the Zion Narrows from the bottom up is summer and early fall, when the Virgin River runs low and warm. It's also monsoon season — the window that makes the hike most inviting is the same one that makes it most dangerous.
A broad, grassy alpine tundra ridge climbing toward a rounded volcanic summit in the Tushar Mountains of south-central Utah, wildflowers dotting the slope under a blue sky.
Adventures

The Tushar Mountains: Utah's Highest Peaks Almost Nobody Knows

The Tushar Mountains are a volcanic range east of Beaver that rise past 12,000 feet — the third-highest range in Utah, and the tallest peaks anywhere in the state south of the Uintas. A million people a year drive past on I-15 and never learn their name.
A hiker walking alone through a narrow red-rock slot canyon in Canyonlands National Park, sunlight spilling down the striped sandstone walls.
Adventures

The Quietest Trail in Each of Utah's Mighty Five National Parks

While the crowds line up for Angels Landing and Delicate Arch, there's a trail in each of Utah's Mighty Five where you can walk for an hour and pass almost no one. Here's the best low-crowd hike in Zion, Bryce, Arches, Canyonlands, and Capitol Reef.
A lone hiker descending a boulder-strewn talus slope high on Kings Peak, looking out over the vast green Henry's Fork basin dotted with alpine lakes under a bright blue sky with scattered clouds, in the High Uintas Wilderness of northeastern Utah.
Adventures

Kings Peak: How to Climb the Highest Mountain in Utah

The highest point in Utah is a 13,528-foot summit buried so deep in the High Uintas that almost everyone climbs it from a trailhead across the line in Wyoming — a 28-to-30-mile round trip most people spread over two or three days.
The view from the Timpanogos Cave entrance high on the wall of American Fork Canyon — steep forested slopes and rugged limestone cliffs dropping to the valley floor far below, under a blue sky, in the Wasatch Mountains of northern Utah.
Adventures

Timpanogos Cave: The 45-Degree World You Have to Climb 1,092 Feet to Reach

There's no shuttle and no elevator. To reach Timpanogos Cave you hike a strenuous 1.5-mile trail up the wall of American Fork Canyon, gaining 1,092 feet — and the reward is a 55-minute tour through three connected caves that hold a steady 45 degrees while the trail outside tops 100.
A high alpine trail climbing toward a rugged Wasatch summit ridge.
Adventures

Trail of the Week: Mount Timpanogos

A summer push up the Wasatch's most beloved giant — wildflowers, a hanging glacier, and a summit ridge with views into three counties.
A modern overlanding vehicle parked near a campfire at dusk in the remote Utah desert.
Adventures

Overlanding the San Rafael Swell

A comprehensive guide to a multi-day, vehicle-supported expedition through some of Utah's most challenging terrain.