Hiking the Syncline Loop Trail, Canyonlands National Park, Moab, Utah
The upcoming forecast for Moab was looking perfect so Mike and I decided to head to Utah for a few days of activities. Since we had the benefit of going midweek, we decided to check out the Island in the Sky portion of Canyonlands National Park, a part of the park I had never been to.
We camped outside of the park the night before and headed into the park bright and early on a weekday morning. We parked at the Upheaval Dome Trailhead and headed out on the Syncline Loop Trail in a clockwise direction. The trail starts out fairly flat for the first 10-20 minutes until you hit a lookout point. The view from this spot was one of my favorites on the trail. From here, the trail descends to the bottom of the canyon and was the hardest part of the day on our knees.
Once we hit canyon bottom, the trail follows a dried up stream bed. We saw a herd of bighorn sheep that was unsure of what to think about presence. As we continued along the loop, the trail started to slowly ascend toward what looked like an impassable section of rocks and cliffs. Thankfully, it was passable, but Mike and I were very happy to hike this section of the trail in an uphill direction (this part is why we did the hike in a clockwise direction). Coming down that part of the trail would have involved some more route finding than I would have liked and probably some inadvertent roller skating on loose rocks. We saw two people coming down this section as we were going up, and I don’t think they were enjoying themselves. These were also the first people we saw of the day! I recommend looking back at where you came from at the top of this section for some great views.
Once we got to the top of the scramble-y section, the trail flattens out a bit and loosely follows another old stream bed. Slowly, the canyon gets smaller and smaller as we continued to gently ascend. We ended up passing only one other person that was hiking the trail that day - a pleasant surprise to see only a handful of people on a trail in a National Park. As we approached the trailhead, we were met with tens of cars parked along the road. It seemed everyone came to our trailhead to do the very short hike to Upheaval Dome. I decided to see what all of the excitement was about and added on the short hike to the lookout point. That blog post can be found here.
Overall, I really enjoyed this hike. It contained some beautiful views, interesting terrain to hike, and was particularly quiet for a National Park. If you’re looking for a hike to get away from the crowds and have the fitness for it (and water!), I believe this one should be a consideration.
Total stats: 8.1 miles, 1500 ft of elevation gain
