Arches National Park – Utah

The History of Arches National Park

Arches National Park sits in the red rock desert of eastern Utah, just north of Moab and along the Colorado River. It holds more than two thousand natural sandstone arches, the highest concentration of them anywhere in the world, along with balanced rocks, fins, spires, and towers. The most famous of them, Delicate Arch, stands alone atop a slickrock bowl and has become the symbol of the whole state, the one you see on the Utah license plate.

How the Arches Formed

All of this sits on top of an ancient salt bed laid down more than three hundred million years ago, when seas flowed into the region and evaporated, over and over. The salt was buried under thousands of feet of debris that hardened into rock. Salt under that kind of pressure is unstable, and as it shifted, the rock above it cracked and buckled into long vertical fins. Water and ice worked into those cracks, and over a very long time the weaker rock wore away and left openings behind. The arches are still forming and still falling. Landscape Arch, the longest in the park, stretches more than three hundred feet, longer than a football field.

From Monument to National Park

People have passed through this country for thousands of years. A Civil War veteran named John Wesley Wolfe settled near what is now the Delicate Arch trail in the late 1800s, and his weathered cabin still stands. In the 1920s a local prospector named Alexander Ringhoffer was so taken with the formations that he wrote to the railroad to try to get the area noticed, and the campaign worked. President Herbert Hoover established Arches National Monument in 1929, and in 1971 Congress redesignated it as a national park.

A Park That Found Its Crowds

Arches was a quiet place for most of its history. It did not cross a million visitors a year until 2010. Since then it has become one of the busiest parks in the country, with well over a million and a half people a year, and the crowds got heavy enough that the park now runs a timed entry reservation system during the busy season. It is worth knowing before you go, because the experience today is a very different one from what it was even a couple of decades back.

Know Before You Go

• Region: Southwest United States
• Location: Grand County, eastern Utah, about 5 miles north of Moab
• Address: Arches National Park, Moab, UT 84532 (Visitor Center off US 191)
• Coordinates: 38.7331, -109.5925
• Costs: NPS Fee $20 – $30; America the Beautiful pass accepted
• Schedule: Open year-round, 24 hours a day. A timed entry reservation is required during the busy season (typically spring through fall). Check the NPS site before you go.
• Attraction Type: National Park
• Activities: Scenic driving, hiking, photography, stargazing, the Delicate Arch trail, Landscape Arch and Devils Garden, the Windows, Balanced Rock, Park Avenue
• Notes:
  • During peak season you need a timed entry reservation in addition to your park pass. Book it ahead through the NPS reservation system, because they sell out.
  • Summer is brutally hot and exposed, with very little shade. Carry far more water than you think you need and hike early.
  • Delicate Arch is the signature hike, about 3 miles round trip with a steady climb and no shade. Sunset is popular and crowded.
  • The cryptobiotic soil crust along the trails is alive and takes decades to recover from a single footprint. Stay on the trail and the slickrock.
  • Cell signal is limited. Download maps before you arrive.
• Additional Resources: NPS Official Site

My Visit

I came through Arches in 2006 with my brother, on the fourth day of a road trip home from Arizona. It was a full day, Moab to Blanding, with more than one park on the list, so we did not have time to linger. We drove the park road and stopped at all the usual places, Balanced Rock, the Windows, the overlooks, and got out to take photos at each of the big sights. We did not spend long at any one of them, but we made sure to see them.

The thing I remember most, looking back, is how quiet it was. There were people there, but nothing like what you find today. We pulled into stops without much trouble, took our pictures, and moved on. Arches now runs a timed entry system in the busy season to manage the crowds, and a million and a half people come through every year. In 2006 it just felt like a wide open desert full of impossible rock, and we had room to take it in at our own pace. I am glad we saw it when we did.

Photos From My Trip

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