Photo Friday: Broken Bow Arch

Today's photos are from a relatively easy hike (just over 5 miles RT, but with some fun stuff involving the willows in the creek bed) back in April. Still roaming about the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, and this trailhead lies some 44 miles from the pavement off the Hole-in-the-Rock road. The road is passable to a passenger car at least in good weather, but there are times when you need to calculate the best route among the rocks.

For the record, all photos were shot on my phone, as my poor, much-abused Sony RX100 finally succumbed to the grit of many backpacking trips. I kicked against carrying the much larger and heavier SonyRX10, but realized after this hike that I needed to bite the bullet and do so.

Like most hikes in this area, we started high, on the rim of the canyon/wash/gulch, and dropped  down to the good stuff. That means always bearing in mind that the end of the hike is uphill and often in the heat of the day.

At this point we've already dropped a ways down the sand slope, and are about to dive into the canyon.

 

We turned upstream when we hit the canyon bottom, to check out a fun little narrows and locate a hanging garden, which was looking a little stressed by lack of water.

Not a slot canyon. Just some fun stuff to scramble through.

 

Maybe it was just kind of early for the monkey flowers to be out.

There were some flowers , including desert primrose, a reliable favorite of mine.

Continuing down the canyon, hikers have a choice of more narrows or climbing above. I chose the narrows, which again aren't deep enough to be slots but occasionally required a bit of a scramble over rocks or in and out of potholes.

Probably the most challenging bit. Nothing to worry about.

 Soon we'd left any narrows behind, and were walking in a wash 20 or 30' wide, with more flowers, cottonwoods, and willows.

Cliffrose

Sweet pea.

 

Finding a path through the willows.

After the junction with Willow Gulch's main branch, the canyon widened in places, while in others (see above) it narrowed so that there was no place to walk but the willow-choked stream bed. 

There was water.

 

Finally, the first sight of the main attraction--Broken Bow Arch.

I was committed to getting behind the arch for photos, which took some wandering around as I missed the one way down to cross the stream and reach the arch. Eventually I got there and took many, many photos. I've narrowed it down to about five...

The view from the hill across the stream.

I eventually found my way across, climbed the sand slop next to the arch, and got up the hill for some perspective.

Panorama--thus a bit distorted but still gives the setting.

Moving closer--looking through the arch upstream, where we came from (and have to return).

A window to another world?

The view from under the arch. There were enough large rocks where I was standing (rocks that fell from the span) that I didn't feel like lingering there!

The weather began to change--as forecast--as we hiked back to the car. On the climb out just before noon it didn't look bad to the SE...

 
... But to the NW weather was happening. I prefer not to be in a canyon when this happens.

The storm held off until mid-afternoon, but eventually we got heavy rain, hail, and graupel, on into the night. There was a good break about half past 4, and we decided that smart campers called that dinnertime. That was a good call--the storm really hit just about the time we were cleaning up.

 And in the morning? All gone, all dry, and a beautiful day!

Breakfast in our lovely camp.

Tune in next week for more photos from the Escalante Area, maybe some misc. stuff and more great close-ups of cool rocks, maybe our 3-day backpack into lower Coyote Gulch.

©Rebecca M. Douglass, 2025   
As always, please ask permission to use any photos or text. Link-backs appreciated.

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