Hidden Valley Trail

The Hidden Valley Trail is about a 5 mile round trip that passes through a narrow elevated valley in the rocky terrain near Moab in southeast Utah. The trail head is about 3 miles south of the center of Moab off of Angel Rock Road on the opposite side of Highway 191 from the Moab golf course.

The first part of the trail climbs with switchbacks 680 feet up through the jumbled sandstone cliff. From below the notch into the Hidden Valley isn’t visible. There are good views back toward the south part of Moab as the trail rises.

In Hidden Valley the trail is flat and smooth and surrounded on both sides by towering walls of rock. The valley floor is grassy with scattered Utah Junipers and scattered desert shrubs. This trail connects to the Moab Rim 4WD trail that starts along the Colorado River and the Kane Creek Road. It is about 2.4 miles to the marked junction of the two trails. Vehicles aren’t able to continue past the end of the Moab Rim Trail.

On the right or north side of the Hidden Valley Trail at the junction with the Moab Rim Trail there is a long cliff face that has several unpublicized rock art petroglyph panels. About 200 yards past the junction there is an unmarked side trail that climbs up to the base of the cliffs. The side trail runs both up and down the cliff face. Most of the five or six art panels are to the right and uphill spread out over about 200 yards.

There are a variety of images including many mountain sheep, human figures, geometric designs and at least two flute players.

The side trail also goes to the left, around a corner and up a short side canyon that is behind the main canyon wall. In the side canyon there is at least one more rock art panel that sits high above the floor and takes a little climbing to get up to.

It is an interesting panel that includes a line of marchers wearing backpacks and led by flute players. It is somewhat similar to the Procession Panel in the Comb Ridge area of southeast Utah near the town of Bluff. There may be as many as six flute players in this panel.

The return hike has views of the LaSal Mountains to the east. It took me about 30 minutes to climb to the entrance to Hidden Valley and a total time of 1:15 to arrive at the junction of the Hidden Valley and Moab Rim Trails. I spent about 1:15 hours to view the petroglyphs and then 1:00 hour to return to the trail head. My total hike took 3:30 hours for about 5 miles. I carried 2 liters of water on an 85 F day in late September and drank it all.

Moab Rim Trail

The Moab Rim Trail is a multi user trail route that climbs to the cliffs overlooking the west side of Moab in southeast Utah. It offers 3.5 miles of road before connecting with the Hidden Valley hiking trail which approaches from the south.

The Trailhead is well marked and is located on Kane Creek Road about 2.5 miles west of the junction with Highway 191.The trail climbs steeply in the first mile, gaining about 1000 feet. There are increasing spectacular views of the Colorado River as it winds toward the Canyonlands National Park. The trail is easy to follow as there are tire marks and oil spots on the Kayenta Sandstone.

The arch known as Little Arch is visible in the top of the cliffs on the opposite side of the Colorado River. Little Arch can be viewed from above along the Poison Spider Trail.

It took me about 30 minutes to get to the top where there are wide views overlooking Moab with some of the arches in Arches National Park visible and the La Sal Mountains to the east. There are some short trails to explore in the overlook area.

The trail cuts away from the rim and splits forming a loop. The left loop follows a sandy wash between large Navajo Sandstone domes and there is a small arch to the left. I think this one is called Buttress Arch. I spent a few minutes getting up under the arch for the blue sky angle, and then followed the right side of the loop.

The route is a two track road for a while then climbs a dome that looked unbelievable to try to drive over. There are good views in all directions from the top of the rocky knob. After descending from the top, the sandy wash part of the loop connects and then the road splits again and ends.

I turned back and followed the sandy part of the loop down a steep slope to explore a side canyon that had several alcoves. This looked like a likely place to find Indian Ruins. This was a scenic and narrow rocky area with some seep springs and lush vegetation but I didn’t see any ruins in the several alcoves.

From here I followed the sandy wash back toward the trail head. There may be ruins or petroglyphs on the road further along the road on the right fork.

There was quite a bit of 4WD drive activity on the trail in this mild April afternoon, with traffic jams forming as the vehicles labored past the tricky spots on this difficult route. With my side trips, it took me 3:00 hours to get to my turn around point, but only 1:15 to return to the bottom for a total hike of 4:15.