An Ode To The Road

What’s in a sunrise? A sunset?

We revel in their ephemeral beauty for fleeting moments each day. But beyond the pastel colors and artistry writ large, I believe they hold another intrinsic appeal: a new lens within which we can view the world. As the wavelengths of visible light stretch and shrink — hues of red, orange, yellow, blue and purple bleeding together — even everyday, mundane surroundings transform into their respective ideals.

Sunrises and sunsets change our perspective. No one is ever really the same, the sky’s equivalent of a fingerprint. The ordinary becomes altogether unique.

North Window at sunrise, Arches National Park. ©Greg Iacurci

The Milky Way over North Window, Arches National Park. ©Greg Iacurci

I spent nearly two weeks chasing the sun in Utah’s national parks, rising early to see first light on ancient arches and spires and hiking miles through the dark after seeing the day’s final embers glow in brilliant canyons and valleys. In Utah, where the landscape already has an ethereal, daydream quality, sunrises and sunsets can be downright sublime.

In short: They’re worth chasing.

Thousands of hoodoo spires catch fire at sunrise. Bryce Amphitheater, as seen from Bryce Point. ©Greg Iacurci

Sunset on the Fairyland Loop Trail, Bryce Canyon. Pastel colors of Bryce’s hoodoos bleed into each other in this long exposure. ©Greg Iacurci

The desert of southern Utah hosts an impressive concentration and diversity of natural marvels. I visited perhaps the best-known of them: Arches, Bryce, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef and Zion National Parks, collectively known as the “Mighty Five,” and tiptoed over the Arizona border to Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park.

The two-week road trip took me through iconic Western backdrops of freestanding red-rock monoliths and, in my estimation, some of the most beautiful and remote stretches of highway in America. In the span of a day, you might well confront soaring fins of Entrada sandstone, Grand Canyon-esque crevices gouged by meandering rivers or narrow slot canyons of polished rock the height of skyscrapers.

The Mitten Buttes and Merrick Butte are Monument Valley’s signature rock formations. ©Greg Iacurci

The Narrows in Zion National Park is one of America’s premier hikes. The “trail” is almost entirely in the Virgin River and sided by walls 1,000 feet tall. ©Greg Iacurci

The geology here is mind-bending, in both scale and age. Most features owe their origins to processes that began tens of millions of years ago, when dinosaurs roamed and present-day rock structures existed as mere sediment in tidal flats or the beds of ancient streams and oceans. Rafting down the Colorado River in Westwater Canyon, I saw among the oldest exposed rock layers in the world: a 1.75 billion-year-old tranche of black obsidian, almost half the age of the earth itself.

Dead Horse Point State Park at sunset. ©Greg Iacurci

It’s a mental quandary to consider how that same geological dynamism might mold the land in the future. What will these parks look like in 100,000 years? 100 million? 1 billion? Delicate Arch and Landscape Arch — treasures of Arches National Park — and countless others will long be reduced to rubble. Born of water and time, erosion will also prove their ultimate demise. “It will eventually succumb to the same forces that created it,” the National Park Service writes on a placard near Delicate Arch.

What new, picturesque creations might eventually blossom in their place?

Delicate Arch at sunrise, Arches National Park. ©Greg Iacurci

Angels Landing, Zion National Park. ©Greg Iacurci

Utah geology can be as comical as it is impressive, largely owing to whimsical descriptions of its prominent features: “hoodoos” in Bryce Canyon; “wrinkles,” “folds,” and “pockets” in Capitol Reef; “entrenched meanders” that gouge the cliffs in Canyonlands. Delicate Arch, a mainstay of Utah license plates, has even assumed nicknames like “Cowboy Chaps” and “Old Maid’s Bloomers.”

All are part of the Colorado Plateau, a massive, 150,000-square-mile region of high desert in the Southwest that hosts the largest concentration of national parks and monuments in the U.S., including the Grand Canyon.

Sun rays peek from behind blackened tree limbs in Arches National Park. ©Greg Iacurci

A tree perched atop a hoodoo on Bryce Canyon’s Fairyland Loop Trail. ©Greg Iacurci

In this “red rock country,” arches, buttes and mesas underwent a daily metamorphosis from deep purples to rusty reds and oranges and back again as the sun leapt over or crept under the horizon.

The sun could dazzle unexpectedly even in harsh midday light, its hot, spiky tendrils poking out from behind thousands of rainbow hoodoos, which stand like stoic, oversized peppermills, hammers and daggers; or framed by the gnarled limbs of lifeless juniper trees, black fossils scattered across the parched, barren earth; or nestled inside the hollow of an arch caressing the azure sky.

On one hike in Bryce Canyon — the Fairyland Loop Trail — it was as if the hills themselves had swallowed the sun, radiating impossible hues of yellow and orange, a logic-defying panorama from the mind of Dr. Suess.

The Milky Way over rock features in Bryce Canyon, a designated International Dark Sky Park. ©Greg Iacurci

The landscape was electric even when the sun retreated.

Utah’s Mighty Five are each International Dark Sky Parks. Clear nights brimmed with stellar fireworks, the Milky Way like an inky white arm reaching across the heavens, illuminated by the glow of faraway stars that may have died out long ago but whose light only now graces our eyes after hurtling trillions of miles through the vacuum of space.

The arch of North Window crisscrosses the inky streak of the Milky Way. ©Greg Iacurci

Utah ignited a part of my soul, one tucked away, lying dormant until those rare and treasured travel experiences stir it anew.

And I suppose that’s why we chase — whether it be a sunrise, a sunset, or any aspect of globetrotting. Those fleeting yet immutable moments of shock, awe, wonder — there’s nothing quite like it.

Switchbacks along the Navajo Loop Trail in Bryce Canyon. Sun rays attempt to penetrate the narrow passage, lined with colorful limestone. ©Greg Iacurci

Laying on an outcrop of red Arizona sandstone, my chin hanging 1,000 feet above the ground as I absorbed the calm, steady current of the Colorado River below and sheer cliffs of Horseshoe Bend extending around me, I was overwhelmed by an appreciation for water.

Water, as I came to realize over the course of a week-long road trip across a swath of the American Southwest, is nature’s most gifted artist.

Michaelangelo carved the David; Rodin gave us The Thinker. But H₂O sculpted the Grand Canyon, with its seemingly infinite buttes, fissures and hues of red. It etched the snaking 270-degree curve of Horseshoe Bend. And it crafted countless other natural treasures — Antelope Canyon, with smooth, undulating walls that that ebb and flow like painted waves of stone; Zion National Park, its pink and white mountains thrust upward like giant stony knuckles; and the Little Colorado River Gorge, which plunges precariously, yet almost nonchalantly, into the earth.

Our everyday interactions with water — whether drinking it by the glass or even flushing a toilet — make the substance seem fairly benign. But water in motion methodically and inexorably erodes and shapes rock in an unparalleled way over millions of years. In the Southwest, the process yielded some of the most monumental and unforgettable landscapes I’ve had the pleasure to behold, bursting with color and character.

The sites my friends and I visited are part of the same geological formation, the Colorado Plateau, which spans the area known as the Four Corners, where Colorado, Utah, Arizona and Nevada meet. Encompassing 240,000 square miles, it’s the second-largest plateau in the world. (It ranks behind the Tibetan Plateau, which covers an area larger than Western Europe.) The geological uplift of the Colorado Plateau led to rapid downcutting by the region’s rivers, which gave us the mountains and canyons that several million people from around the world visit each year. Some geologists believe the plateau has risen as much as 10,000 feet since the uplift began about 20 million years ago. The plateau is so colossal that it’s visible from space, in the shape of a heart.

Antelope Canyon Horseshoe Bend Page Arizona

There was something strange about these surreal and beautiful places — they were practically hidden in plain sight. You could be 50 feet from the rim of the Grand Canyon, trekking through the pine trees of the Kaibab National Forest, and not realize that the earth disappears into a mile-deep chasm just a few paces ahead. The same was true of Horseshoe Bend and especially Antelope Canyon, which from above doesn’t look like anything more than a two-foot-wide crack in the earth. It’s like Mother Nature used a decoy to safeguard her most valuable gems.

The drive to and from these destinations rivaled the experience of seeing them up close — as one might expect from a variation of what I’ll call the quintessential Great American Road Trip. Arizona and Utah are huge states with seemingly endless tracts of wild land. I expected a fairly static landscape, but was surprised to find that the view from our car window changed steadily over the course of our roughly 700-mile journey — flat expanses of golden grass morphed into a panorama of low-lying desert shrubs and juniper trees, gradually becoming a forest of towering conifers, followed by long stretches of red-rock cliffs and then by rolling hills sprinkled with herds of grazing buffalo. And then the cycle would repeat. Hours-long car rides felt like an adventure.

A herd of buffalo grazing near Zion National Park in Utah.

One week wasn’t nearly enough to explore all that the Southwest has to offer. I could have easily spent another week or two hiking additional trails in the national parks we visited or traveling to other destinations like Bryce Canyon National Park, Arches National Park, Canyonlands National Park, Capitol Reef National Park and Monument Valley.

My travel crew. Doe Mountain in Sedona, Arizona, is the perfect place to catch a leisurely sunset.

The following itinerary, which starts in Phoenix and ends in Las Vegas, is a great way to get the most out of a week-long trip to this iconic region of the U.S.

Day 1: Sedona

Fly into Phoenix, Arizona, and make the roughly 115-mile journey to Sedona, a city renowned for its beautiful red-rock formations. (Fun fact: Sedona was named for the wife of the area’s first postmaster, T.C. Schnebly. Other names in the mix included Oak Creek Crossing and Schnebly Station.)

Capitol Butte, also known as Thunder Mountain, at twilight.

Enjoy the scenic drive through a stretch of the Sonoran Desert. The Saguaro cactus calls this desert home, and the landscape is peppered with thousands of these cucumber-looking, multi-armed sentinels, which can grow to be dozens of feet tall.

You’re in for a treat if your drive coincides with the sunset: the distant mountains glow purple in the twilight.

Day 2: Sedona

Take a morning tour into red-rock country with Pink Adventure Tours to learn about some of the region’s geology and history. (We did the 2 ½ hour tour to a deep ravine called Diamondback Gulch.) Be prepared for a bumpy ride as your tour guide steers a bright-pink Jeep Wrangler off-road into the rugged terrain of the Coconino National Forest. Get prime glimpses of monoliths like Thunder Mountain and more ornate structures like Snail Rock and Chimney Rock along the way.

Sedona Arizona hikes Fay Canyon red rocks

Sedona Arizona sunset hikes Doe Mountain red rocks

After lunch, set out on one or two of Sedona’s dozens of hiking trails. (The website AllTrails.com can help gauge trail length and difficulty.) We did the easy, 2.6-mile Fay Canyon trail in the afternoon. See the rocks glow red in the sunset from the east-facing vantage point of Doe Mountain, a moderately challenging 1.6-mile trail. Devil’s Bridge and Boynton Canyon are two other popular hikes.

Day 3: Grand Canyon (South Rim)

The Grand Canyon looks almost fake when standing on the edge looking in. Trying to comprehend its stunning beauty, let alone the sheer size of it — a mile deep, up to 18 miles across and 277 miles long — seems almost as impossible a mental exercise as grasping the scale of our solar system or universe. It’s worth getting to Grand Canyon National Park, a designated World Heritage Site, as early as possible to absorb every inch you can.

Choose from any number of half-day or day-long hikes along the South Rim. I’d recommend the South Kaibab Trail to Skeleton Point, a challenging 5.6-mile out-and-back trail with nearly 2,000 feet of elevation gain on the ascent. The trail extends down and outward into the canyon, and the view from Skeleton Point, roughly halfway to the canyon floor, affords a glimpse of the Colorado River below and nearly 360-degree views of the canyon walls around you. Expect the hike to take anywhere from 4 to 6 hours. (For a shorter, less-strenuous hike — though no less scenic — hikers can turn around at various other vantage points along the way like Ooh Aah Point or Cedar Ridge.)

Day 4: Grand Canyon and the Little Colorado River Gorge

Spend a half day exploring more of the Grand Canyon’s South Rim before the drive to Page, Arizona, a sleepy town of roughly 7,000 that serves as a jumping-off point to see Horseshoe Bend and Antelope Canyon.

South Kaibab Trail, Grand Canyon National Park.

Expansive views from Desert View Watchtower, Grand Canyon National Park.

For a more leisurely morning, make a relatively quick stop at the Desert View Watchtower, a 70-foot tower situated near the eastern edge of the Grand Canyon. From the tower, glimpse the Colorado River and the canyon’s North Rim. A clear day affords views for more than 100 miles around.

After leaving the park’s east entrance, take a short drive to the Little Colorado River Gorge Overlook. The gorge, around 3,000 feet at its deepest, is one of the largest arms of the Grand Canyon, formed by the Little Colorado River, a tributary of its larger sibling.

Day 5: Horseshoe Bend and Antelope Canyon

Horseshoe Bend is, as its name implies, a horseshoe-shaped twist (technically called an “entrenched meander”) in the Colorado River that’s 1,000 feet deep and located in Glen Canyon. It gets overrun with tourists by mid-morning, so arrive early.

Then take a short drive to the Glen Canyon Dam, the second-highest concrete-arch dam in the U.S. — second only to the Hoover Dam — and take in views of Lake Powell.

After lunch, take a tour of Antelope Canyon. The Navajo name for the canyon, according to our tour guide, translates to “Whirling Canyon,” an apt name since the walls of the narrow slot canyon are swirls of gently stratified sandstone, elegantly weaving in and out to form otherworldly shapes.

Antelope Canyon Lower Antelope Canyon Upper Antelope Canyon

You need to reserve a guided tour for entry to Antelope Canyon, which is on Navajo land. Visitors can choose from among a handful of local tour operators to visit one of two sections — Upper Antelope Canyon or Lower Antelope Canyon. There are debates as to which is better, but you honestly can’t go wrong either way. (We did the Lower canyon, which is narrower and requires a climb down a flight of stairs to gain access.) Space in the roughly 90-minute tours sell out months in advance — especially for slots around late morning and midday when the light is best — so plan accordingly.

Here’s a list of tour operators for the Lower Canyon (Ken’s Tours, Dixie Ellis Lower Antelope Canyon) and Upper Canyon (Antelope Canyon Navajo Tours, Antelope Slot Canyon Tours, Antelope Canyon Tours and Adventurous Antelope Canyon Tours).

Antelope Canyon Arizona Lower Antelope Canyon Upper Antelope Canyon

Next, drive the scenic route down Highway 89A to Kanab, Utah — a launching point for Zion National Park — with a quick detour to Lee’s Ferry for a stroll along the banks of the Colorado River.

The drive, which winds through Marble Canyon and passes by the North Rim of the Grand Canyon, adds more than an hour to the more direct route to Kanab, but proved to be one of the highlights of the trip. (We got this route recommendation from two different locals.) The drive is a microcosm of the diverse Arizona and Utah landscapes, with close-up views of colossal red-rock canyon walls, plains of yellow desert grass and forests of towering pines.

Day 6: Zion National Park

Entering Zion National Park, Utah’s oldest national park, requires a drive through a mile-long tunnel cut into the heart of a mountain. It provides a several-minute-long buildup of anticipation to the fireworks display on the other side: colossal cream, pink and rust-colored mountains towering above a canyon floor replete with deciduous trees, bursting with yellow and red leaves in the fall season. The canyon, carved by the Virgin River, is a decidedly different backdrop from the Arizona landscape.

Fun geological fact: The bottom layer of rock at Zion, which was a flat basin near sea level 240 million years ago, is the top layer of rock at the Grand Canyon.

The red, cream and pink mountains of Zion National Park.

Embark on a few of the park’s extraordinary hiking trails. Angels Landing is the park’s most popular, and for good reason — it was the most epic hike I’ve done to date. The first two miles are a fairly straightforward climb up a paved section of steep switchbacks (amusingly called Walter’s Wiggles). But the last half mile is the standout: from Scout Lookout, cross a narrow ridge with sheer drops on both sides, scrambling over rocks and grasping a metal chain bolted into the mountain for support, to reach the summit. In addition to a major adrenaline rush, you’ll earn unmatched views of Zion Canyon from 1,500 feet above the ground. (Note: not an ideal trek for children, those with a fear of heights or in wet/icy conditions.)

The view of Zion Canyon from Angels Landing.

The Angels Landing hike is an epic trek across a narrow spine of rock 1,500 feet above the canyon floor.

The Narrows is one of the park’s other popular trails, an out-and-back hike into the narrowest part of Zion Canyon, with the river just 20 to 30 feet wide in spots between cliff walls 1,000 feet tall. You will get wet — the hike itself is in the Virgin River, and can range from ankle-high water to chest height in some parts depending on the time of year.

For a complete list of Zion’s hiking trails, click here.

Day 7: Las Vegas and the Valley of Fire

If you’re feeling ambitious, do a half day in Zion before driving to Las Vegas for a (somewhat jarring) return to civilization, replete with vices, flashing lights and hordes of people.

On the way to Sin City, make a pit stop at the Valley of Fire, a state park with huge, red sandstone formations jutting out of the earth in middle-of-nowhere Nevada. The rock, in parts, was so porous it looked like Swiss cheese, while in others it was marbled with pink-and-white zebra stripes.

If you go

When to go:

Spring or Fall. I went in mid-October, which was perfect — slightly smaller crowds, daytime temperatures in the mid-70s and nothing but sunshine. The trade-off: slightly shorter days and cool nighttime temperatures in the 40s and 50s. (Note: The North Rim of the Grand Canyon closes each year around mid-October due to snowfall. The South Rim is open year-round.) Peak season (Memorial Day to Labor Day) brings big crowds and scorching heat.

Standout eateries:

Sedona: Creekside Coffee and Bakery (breakfast); Wildflower Bread Company (lunch); Elote or The Hudson (dinner).

Grand Canyon (South Rim): Head to the restaurant/cocktail bar at the El Tovar Hotel, situated in the park right on the canyon’s edge, before sunset for a light show and some well-earned sustenance.

Kanab: Kanab Creek Bakery (breakfast), Rocking V Cafe (dinner)

Chasing the Sun in Utah

A week in the American Southwest