Skip to main content

2016 Fall Mountain Trip Part 15; A Dead Horse of course and Utah State Route 313

After leaving Canyonlands National Park I returned to Utah State Route 313 and headed towards the overlook of the Colorado River at Dead Horse Point State Park.


This blog post serves as Part 15 in the Fall Mountain Trip series; Part 14 can be found here:

2016 Fall Mountain Trip Part 14; Canyonlands National Park and the Island in the Sky

As stated in the previous blog UT 313 was approved in 1975 and was built over an existing Grand County Highway to Dead Horse Point State Park.  UT 313 essentially replaced UT 279 which was never completed as intended.  UT 313 is a 22.5 mile north/south State Highway stretching from US 191 to Dead Horse Point State Park.  UT 313 also serves the secondary purpose of providing access to the Island of the Sky District of Canyonlands National Park.  From Island of the Sky Road I took a right turn on UT 313 southbound towards Dead Horse Point State Park.


Dead Horse Point State Park is one of my most frequently visited State Parks in any state I've been to.  Dead Horse Point provides a highly scenic overlook of a large bend in the Colorado River as it winds through the Canyonlands towards a confluence with the Green River.  Dead Horse Point State Park was created in 1959 and was once a natural corral point.  The name "Dead Horse" comes from the 19th Century when it was used to corral horses.  When the gates of the corral were released the horses never left and eventually died of exposure on the high vista above the Colorado River.  The photo below of the Dead Horse Point State Park sign comes from the winter of 2013.


Dead Horse Point State Park has various hiking trails on the rim of the Canyonlands above the Colorado River.  This particular vista over looks the Potash Mines located at the end of UT 279 and the La Sal Range to the east.


From Dead Horse Point as stated above a large bend in the Colorado River can be observed.  The view is breath taking but a keen observer will notice a small dirt road below.  Said dirt road is Potash Road which connects UT 279 to the White Rim Road which in turn connects to Canyonlands National Park via Shafer Canyon Road.


Suffice to say there is hell of a panoramic photo opportunity at Dead Horse Point.


For comparison sake this photo of Dead Horse Point is from the winter of 2013.


And a gloomy fall in 2015.


While I didn't take many photos of UT 313 in 2016 I did take several in 2015 of the descent to US 191.  UT 313 is a surprisingly tame roadway with only two major hairpins that have normal widths.





That said this photo of the UT 313 north terminus at US 191 is from 2016.  From the end of UT 313 I turned south on US 191 towards Moab and Arches National park.


Part 16 of this series can be found here:

2016 Fall Mountain Trip Part 16; Arches National Park and the first Utah State Route 93





Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Chowchilla Mountain Road to Yosemite National Park

Chowchilla Mountain Road of Mariposa County is one of the oldest roadways servicing Yosemite National Park.  As presently configured this fourteen-mile highway begins at California State Route 49 near Elliot Corner and terminates at the Wawona Road in Yosemite National Park.  Chowchilla Mountain Road was constructed as a franchise toll road over Battalion Pass circa 1869-1870.  The highway was built at behest of Galen Clark to connect the town of Mariposa to his property near the South Fork Merced River at what is now Wawona.   In late 1874 the highway along with Clark’s Station would be purchased by the Washburn Brothers.  The Washburn Brothers would continue to toll Chowchilla Mountain Road as part of their Yosemite Stage Route lines.  The highway would ultimately become a Mariposa County public highway in 1917.  Mariposa would later be more directly linked with Yosemite Valley in 1926 following the completion of the Yosemite All-Year Highwa...

Interstate 40's Tumultuous Ride Through the Pigeon River Gorge

In the nearly 60 years Interstate 40 has been open to traffic through the Pigeon River Gorge in the mountains of Western North Carolina, it has been troubled by frequent rockslides and damaging flooding, which has seen the over 30-mile stretch through North Carolina and Tennessee closed for months at a time. Most recently, excessive rainfall from Hurricane Helene in September 2024 saw sections of Interstate 40 wash away into a raging Pigeon River. While the physical troubles of Interstate 40 are well known, how I-40 came to be through the area is a tale of its own. Interstate 40 West through Haywood County near mile marker 10. I-40's route through the Pigeon River Gorge dates to local political squabbles in the 1940s and a state highway law written in 1921. A small note appeared in the July 28, 1945, Asheville Times. It read that the North Carolina State Highway Commission had authorized a feasibility study of a "...water-level road down [the] Pigeon River to the Tennessee l...

Angus L. Macdonald Bridge

At 1.3 kilometers (or about 0.84 miles) in length, the Angus L. Macdonald Bridge is one of two bridges crossing over the Halifax Harbour between Halifax, Nova Scotia and Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, with the other bridge being the A. Murray Mackay Bridge . Opened in 1955 and named after former Nova Scotia Premier and Canadian Minister of Defense for Naval Services Angus L. Macdonald, the Macdonald Bridge was the first bridge that crossed Halifax Harbour that was opened to traffic. The Macdonald Bridge was also the subject of the Big Lift, which was only the second time in history that the span of a suspension bridge were replaced while the bridge was open to traffic. Planning began in 2010 for the Big Lift, while construction took place between 2015 and 2017. Similar work occurred on the Lion's Gate Bridge in Vancouver, British Columbia before the project took place on the Macdonald Bridge. At this time, much of the bridge infrastructure is new, leaving only the towers, main cables and...