Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument could be accessed via
a 47-mile scenic dirt road called Cottonwood Canyon Road. The dirt
road is impassable when it is wet and muddy. Indeed, many hikers
and campers were trapped inside before. Once a man from Page,
Arizona told me that he was strangled there for three days due to
raining. As you can see from
the photos, the clouds were dark while our team was taking photos
in the middle of the road. Fortunately we went through the road
before it rained.
Without stopping it takes about two hours to drive from Page,
Arizona to Escalante, Utah through Cottonwood Canyon Road. But
on our way back to Page, we learned that the probability of
raining was 20%. Several local residents of Escalante advised us
to take the longer paved road, Highway 89, instead of taking
Cottonwood Canyon. The safer but longer route took 3.5 hours!
