Flanigan Arch Hike--Cedar City, UT

You local people will remember the ginormous mudslide that took out like a mile of the canyon road back in the fall of 2011. That mudslide not only blocked access to Duck Creek, Brian Head, and other destinations up SR-14, it also choked up access to the Flanigan Arch hike.

After a lot of construction and wishful thinking on the part of the state, the road is put back together and people can once again head down the gully and reach the river trail up to the Flanigan Arch view.  However, an extra 300 or 400 yard scramble through scrub oak now comprises the beginning of the hike.  I was not prepared for this.  Otherwise, I would not have worn shorts last weekend when Preston and I ventured down the gully to experience the hike for the first time in years.  Actually, I probably would have bailed altogether, but Preston has a way of calling to me through densely thick scrub oak from a few good feet further that the opening is just ahead, I just can't see it.  I heard that like 5 times.

Whatever the tactics, the effort to reach the old trailhead was worth it.  We experienced a gorgeous hike.

I will admit, I argued that these "steps" in the rock had to have been man-made.  There was no way nature did that.  But who am I kidding?  I live in southern Utah, for heaven's sake, where nature is our most brilliant sculptor and artist.  

Forgive me, mother nature.  And well done.

  

Unfortunately, I have been a bit dulled to the beauty that surrounds me since, well, it surrounds me.  But lookey here, trees are growing out of a rock.  A rock with stairs.  Pardon me for not being in awe every single blessed day of my life that I live in such a place.

Lately I was reading about a prominent Cedar City man born in the late 1800s who called southern Utah "God's Great Gardens."  I couldn't help but agree as I wandered this canyon.

  

And here is the arch.  You can actually hike up to it, which we didn't feel inclined to do that day, but I'm sure it is a spectacular view.

Also, that big rock to the...east, right, left?...of the arch looks like the Titanic.

Apparently Preston and his buddies would crawl through this space to get to and from the arch when the water was too high and strong to get through.  My claustrophobic self freaks out a little just imagining being in there and surrounded by high, rapid water.

During the whole hike I was amazed at how colorful the rocks are.  Pink, blue, green, and purple rocks with stripes, spots, swirls.  I don't remember seeing rocks so naturally bright.  That rock is not, like, "nature" pink and yellow, it's like "my 2 year old nephew could tell" pink and yellow.  Crayon pink and yellow.  Amazing, southern Utah pink and yellow.

I kept it.