Capitol Reef National Park Revisited, Utah - October 2nd to 6th, 2024

Capitol Reef National Park was another park we visited during Season One (Capitol Reef National Park - June 22 & 23, 2019) and we revisited during Season Six. And yet again, it was just as much fun to visit the national park the second time as it was the first time.

Wednesday was a short travel day, from Escalante Petrified Forest State Park to Fruita Campground in Capitol Reef. Since it was such a short drive to Capitol Reef, we stopped along the way to do a short hike. We covered that in our previous post (Escalante, Utah - September 28th to October 2nd, 2024).

Our only other stop was in Torrey for gas. When we arrived at Capitol Reef, we dumped and filled our tanks. It was free. Waiting was a good call. After dinner, we walked the campground loops. There are U-pick orchards right next to the campground. Deer were everywhere in the campground and the orchards. They didn’t seem to be bothered too much by all of the people.

Thursday morning we got our internet fix, then went for a bike ride in the afternoon. Since we had to switch camp sites anyway, we moved over to the large parking area in the morning so we could set up Starlink. Ann needed to try to make some more reservations for Season Seven. We pulled into the parking lot just before 9 am.

The lot is right across the road from the Gifford House, where they sell the pies. It opened at 9 am and we could see a long line of people out front waiting for the Gifford House to open. The Gifford House is in the Fruita Historic District. Fruita was a Mormon settlement which planted a lot of orchards in the area. Gifford House is mainly a store but one small room of it is a museum. But not many people go inside to see the museum, they are mainly there for the pies.

After the line died down, we walked over to the Gifford House to buy a couple of cherry pies. The pies are small, a personal size. We didn’t want to wait too long, because we knew they often run out of pies in the afternoon.

After lunch, we moved Red Tail (our Winnebago EKKO) back to the campground and set up in our camp site. It looked like we might be able to get a Starlink connection at this site, but we didn’t try. Starlink draws a significant amount of power from our batteries, so we only like to have it on when we need it. We hadn’t been on a long drive, nor had much solar lately, so our batteries haven’t been up to full charge for a while. While we were parked in the parking lot, we had good solar, but Starlink was taking half of it.

Then we got out our bikes. We rode over to the Visitor Center, about a mile and a half away and watched the park movie. Then we rode a couple of miles east on highway 24. There was a narrow shoulder part of the way, but it was not a very enjoyable ride. A lot of large RV’s were driving by us.

We stopped at the historic Fruita Schoolhouse and then the Petroglyph Panels. We would recommend driving to those instead of riding a bike, although it is easier to find a place to park a bike than a 23 foot RV.

Ann’s energy level was still not very high due to the cold she was fighting. So riding a bike was a nice way to get out and get a little bit of exercise. She was thankful that we have e-bikes and was able to have the power assist on the whole way.

Sitting outside back at camp, we were entertained by the deer again. A buck came walking over, straight at us. When he reached our site, about 20 yards from where we were sitting, he decided to squat and pee, for quite some time. Then he meandered on. We’re not sure if he was sending us a message or not.

Ann was still not feeling healthy enough for a long hike, so we opted for a few short ones and a scenic drive. We started out at the Grand Wash trailhead. After heading up the trail for a little less than a mile, we turned around. The Grand Wash is an easy trail. Following the bottom of a canyon, it is pretty flat with easy footing.

The canyon walls have pockets in them, created by erosion. There are small rocks inside most of the pockets. We’re guessing that people put them there. We could imagine making a game of it, to see if you can throw a rock and get it to land inside a pocket.

We were looking for petroglyphs along the way, but didn’t spot any. Then, on the way back, we noticed some people over by a canyon wall. Oh, they’re looking at a petroglyph, a pretty nice one. How did we miss it on the way out?

We had a letter to mail, so we drove to the little town of Teasdale to their post office. Then we wanted to go for a drive to charge up our house batteries. It had been a while since they had a full charge on them. Since the Capitol Reef Scenic Drive was closed for construction and we didn’t feel like driving dirt roads, such as Burr Trail, we decided to drive through the Fish Lake National Forest instead. We found a little scenic drive by pulling out our road atlas and looking for a road nearby that was marked as scenic. Heading west on highway 24 to the town of Loa, there is a little loop of a scenic drive that goes right by Fish Lake.

First we headed just past the loop on highway 24 to a nice rest area to stop and have a picnic lunch. Then we headed back to pick up route 25 to start the loop. There are several National Forest Service campgrounds along the way, along with a recreation area and resort. Some of the campgrounds and the marina were already closed for the season. The area is beautiful. Although the peak fall color had already passed, there were still many aspen trees with yellow and gold leaves on them, enhancing the lovely landscape.

Route 72 brought us back to Loa. There we stopped at the grocery store, Royal’s Food Town. We needed some rye bread for Reubens and brats. The store in Escalante didn’t have rye bread when we were there and we didn’t buy a substitute because we thought we remembered that Gifford House sold bread. Well, either we remembered wrong or they stopped selling bread. Regardless, we were able to pick up some in Loa.

On the drive out through Torrey, we remembered seeing a creamery. Of course that meant we had to stop on our way back through. The Color Ridge Ice Creamery was a great find. They had interesting flavors and milkshakes, so we were both happy. Despite all the different flavors, Ann ended up with her usual favorites, chocolate and Sweet Mountain Mint.

On the way back to the campground, we made a couple more stops for some short walks and views. Right off the highway is Panorama Point. The road continues past Panorama Point, but turns to dirt. It is only a one mile dirt road to reach Goosenecks Overlook. From there, the trail to Sunset Point is less than a mile round trip. Even though the three viewpoints are not far from each other, the views from each one are different.

The Goosenecks Overlook looks down into the canyon created by Sulphur Creek. We could see people walking in the bottom of the canyon. There really isn’t a trail along the canyon, but they call it a hiking route instead. We’re guessing that just means there is not a well-defined trail and it is not marked. It looks like the access is right behind the Visitor Center.

Saturday was another low-key day. After hanging out at camp in the morning, we hiked part of Cohab Canyon in the afternoon. We didn’t go very far on the trail to make sure we didn’t drain Ann’s energy.

The Cohab Canyon Trailhead is right across the road from the campground. The trail starts out with a series of switchbacks to get up to the start of the canyon. Then it is a gradual decline from there.

The canyon is more colorful, with more interesting rock formations than the Grand Wash, at least as far as we went on both trails. The multi-colored canyon walls are speckled with holes like Swiss cheese.

We turned around at the trail junction with the Fruita Overlook trails. At least we thought we were at the junction. There were no trail signs, which we thought was unusual. By the time we returned to our camp site, we had gone 2.5 miles with an elevation gain of 558 feet in an hour and a half.

After showers and dinner, we went over to the amphitheater for a ranger program. It was the second to last program for the season. It was an interesting program about stars and how they create the different chemical elements of the universe and how those different elements create all of the different colors of the rocks in Capitol Reef.

Sunday was a short driving day, just an hour and a half, from Fruita Campground in Capitol Reef National Park to Goblin Valley State Park, both in Utah. Before we left Capitol Reef, we dumped and filled our tanks, then stopped at the Gifford House to get two more pies. This time we bought the mixed berry pies. Being a Sunday and a weekend, the Gifford House was much busier than when we went on the Thursday before. Even after 10 am, an hour after they open, there was still a line of people out the door. And by the time we reached the cashier, they were already out of apple pies. We overhead the staff saying that they only get a delivery of 24 dozen (or 32 dozen, we can’t remember) pies, the amount that fits in one delivery van, every day.

Despite Capitol Reef Scenic Drive being closed and Ann not having the energy for a long hike, we enjoyed our stay in Capitol Reef. We had a relaxing time exploring some of the same places we visited before along with some new sights. But there are still plenty of things to see and trails to hike. We’ll be back, even if it is only to eat more pies.

Check out our related video: Capitol Reef National Park Revisited

(Ann)