St. George: Cinder Cone and Waterfalls

All around the area we were staying (Gunlock, Utah) there are cinder cone volcanoes. They have such a distinctive shape, and you can see the black lava rock all around them—it's really cool. We were curious to see what they were like up close, but this was another hike in the category of "hikes we didn't mean to do." It was really too hot to hike! And this one was too hard and rocky for Zig to walk himself, so he and Sam stayed at the trailhead. The rest of us thought we'd just go see what it was like. After we all set off, Ziggy said sadly to Sam, "I go walk?" so they ended up hiking around a little too. :)

After awhile the hike got steep—really steep. Abe was way ahead, and he came down to report that it got even worse later. There would be much scrambling involved, he said, if we wanted to reach the top of the crater. But…we'd already come so far! We were hot and sweaty, but it seemed a shame to stop NOW…so we kept going, except for Junie and Teddy, who went back down with Abe.

It was HARD going up the last stretch. The lava rock was really slippery, and so sharp, it would cut you like a razor if you even put your hand down on it (which we couldn't help doing, of course, multiple times).

But the view from the top was marvelous! We could see two more cinder cones in the distance (only one in this picture).

It was cool to look down into the crater, too.

You really can't tell how steep the trail was, in these pictures. I didn't dare get the camera out on the steep parts! It was hard enough trying to support it with one hand as I hiked down. The girls and I went verrrry slowly, and my heart started pounding every time I heard the sound of rocks sliding below me, as I imagined the boys sliding out of control on that sharp, sharp lava rock. But everyone arrived at the bottom intact, thank goodness.

The trail flattened out, though it was still on a steep part of the hillside! It was really pretty. And we were glad we'd gone all the way up—though we certainly wouldn't do it at midday next time!

On the night before we went home, Sam and I went out on a date to a remote little restaurant outside of St. George. Afterwards our GPS took us back to the rental house a different way. We were staying in the tiny town of Gunlock, and we'd driven by a part of Gunlock Reservoir earlier and been unimpressed, so we didn't intend to explore Gunlock State Park any further. (We later realized we hadn't even been looking at the reservoir itself, but just a little arm of it.) But this drive took us into the other end of the State Park, and as we approached the reservoir, we looked out our car windows and saw this:

In the dusky light it was hard to see what it was—I said, "Is that WATER?" and we pulled up closer to investigate. When we got out of the car we could hear that it was water. Lots of it. Waterfalls! We decided we'd go back early in the morning to see if we could hike to them.

And really, I felt like this was kind of a tiny miracle for me. Because quite a few months earlier I'd seen pictures of a friend of mine, who lives in St. George, by some beautiful cascading waterfalls, and I'd immediately thought "I wish I could SEE that place!" But then I'd read about where it was (some small town in Southern Utah; the name didn't mean anything to me) and learned that they were only occasional—that is, the waterfalls only existed sometimes. They were created by runoff from a reservoir and had only last been there seven years ago, and might disappear at any time. I thought to myself, "What are the odds I'd ever be there at the right time anyway?" and dismissed the idea. I didn't even think of looking them up when we came on our trip!

So that evening, when I looked up "Gunlock Reservoir" online, I realized with great surprise that these were the very same waterfalls I'd wished to see! And they were five minutes away from our rental house, but because we'd only driven from the other direction, we never would have seen them if we hadn't happened to be led home that way from the restaurant. I would have been so sad if I'd missed them altogether! I was really grateful that circumstances had all combined to send me this little blessing.

We took whichever children wanted to go with us (Abe, Teddy, and Daisy–the others wanted to stay at the house and play on the trampoline and playground!) and drove to the reservoir. We walked across the top of the embankment dam. The morning light was beautiful!

We could hear rushing water, and then we were suddenly at the top of the falls! From this perspective it just looks like rapids.

But then you hike down a bit and it becomes much more dramatic! I couldn't even capture all the different places the water rushed over the rock. There were only a few other people around at this early hour, photographers, and some of them had leapt across the river to reach other viewpoints—but I didn't dare! We climbed around where we could, though. 

I LOVED this place. I always love waterfalls, and multi-branched ones like this are extra beautiful! And I loved the sound of the crashing water! And the way the white foam stood out on the red rocks! It was probably my favorite thing we did on this trip. At least in the top three! :)

View looking back down toward the road

I'm so glad we were here at the right time, and had a chance to see this lovely place before heading home!