sunset point trail

At sunset this is a great place to visit! The walk is easy, and the views are spectacular. It isn't crowded, and it is oriented in a way that the sun changes things as it sets.

This hike takes you to beautiful scenery that will take on different hues against the rocks depending on the time of day you make the short hike.

My title sums it up. This is a very simple trail with great views, especially at sunset, as the name implies. It was very cold and windy when we were there, with some snow, so we did not hang around as intended, but we were still rewarded with great views. The road leading to the trail is gravel, but easily driven in a normal vehicle, which is what we had.

The Sunset Point trail trailhead is accessed from a parking area at the end of a good 1 mile (1.6 k) dirt road from the Panorama Point parking area off of Hwy 24 and is easily passable by 2 wheel drive passenger vehicles in dry weather. The trail itself is flat, short at 0.3 mile (0.5 k) each way, but not well marked on the relatively barren red slickrock. At the end of the trail one is treated to an excellent view of the colorful Waterpocket Fold as well as several other landmarks of Capitol Reef. As the Waterpocket Fold stretches from north to south and the viewpoint is to the west, the best viewing and photography is late in the day; I would not bother visiting the viewpoint in the morning as the view is backlight and poor versus the evening lighting. The Goosenecks, a very contorted deep gorge that has been cut by the Sulfur Creek, is worth taking a look when exploring the Sunset Point trail and its trailhead shares the same parking area. (Note that the official image shown on TripAdvisor and the other images uploaded by “a Facebook Member, Mar 2010” are actually images from the Navajo Loop trail that starts a Sunset Point in Bryce Canyon National Park.)

We took the short hike in the afternoon, we were the only ones making foot prints in the snow.The weather was great, the roads well maintained.

The short (1/3 mile trail) that leads to Sunset Point is fantastic for late afternoon photography. I enjoyed capturing images of the desert scenery with the red cliffs in the background. You gain access to the trailhead by taking the one mile smooth dirt road from the Panorama Point parking lot.