Taylor Creek Trail, November 25, 2014

The Taylor Creek trail is about a two-mile, easy hike up one of the finger canyons of the less-visited Kolob Terrace section of Zion National Park.  If you don’t have enough time to visit the main area of the park through Springdale, this is a quick excursion that shouldn’t take more than three hours at a leisurely pace.  The trailhead is on the left side of the road as you drive up from the entrance station.  If you have some extra time and don’t mind hiking off-piste, you can follow the creek bed on up to the end of the canyon where the walls narrow down.  For this trip, we turned around at the end of the marked trail.

The trail crosses forth and back over the creek numerous times…plan on splashing if the water is running high.  In late November, there was a nice layer of ice alongside the banks that made crossing easy and dry.

Like the rest of Zion, the high cliffs and towers of the Navajo Sandstone steal the geologic show (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geology_of_the_Zion_and_Kolob_canyons_area) on the Taylor Creek trail.

But a closer look might reveal a few things that aren’t as obvious, or as easily seen on other easy-access trails within the park.  The trail starts half-way up the regional stratigraphic column in the Kayenta Formation, a red layer of interbedded sand and siltstones.  The entire column is uplifted along the Sevier Fault that runs roughly north/south along the base of the cliffs of Hurricane Ridge.  Along the creek, deformation of the Kayenta sedimentary rock can easily be seen.

As you get further up the trail, keep an eye open for the grey limestone of the Carmel Formation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carmel_Formation).  It will be in cobblestone to boulder-sized chunks that have fallen down from above the Navajo Sandstone cliffs.  It’s the remnants of a shallow seabed, and some layers are thick with fossil oysters and pectins, along with coral and crinoids (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crinoid).

There are two cabins built in the 1930’s that are in good condition and fun to explore.  One of the hikers we met on the trail had a level/plumb-bob app on his smart phone, and he was impressed that construction of Fife’s Cabin was so level and square.

The end of the official trail is at the Double Arch Alcove, where erosion of the cliff face has left a grotto along a layer where water seeps.  The second arch overhangs above.

When I took a five-week field course in geology during the summer of 1984, the Taylor Creek trail had not yet been constructed.  We mapped the canyon immediately to the north (which begins on private property), so I’ve been through this section before.  It’s nice that the Taylor Creek trail is now available, allowing easy access to this part of the park that most people only see from out the window as they do the “five-minute” auto tour of the Kolob section of Zion.