Here's Everything You Can Expect From A Getaway to Southern Utah

Southern Utah is filled with stunning red rock canyons, arches and hoodoos—but it also has a decadent side.

Bryce Canyon National Park is filled with red rock mazes ripe for exploration.

The Crux is a rite of passage carved in stone. After 6 miles of walking through towering red rock walls, scrambling down 12-foot ledges and wading through waisthigh water, I face an 8-foot waterfall cascading into a deep pool. I gingerly lower myself into the rushing water and take the plunge. The waterfall is an exhilarating finish to a slot canyon adventure through Sulphur Creek in Utah’s Capitol Reef National Park (nps.gov/care), led by a guide from Sleeping Rainbow Adventures (sradventures.com).

The glamping domes at Skyview

The hike is just one highlight of a recent trip to Utah’s Capitol Reef and Bryce Canyon national parks. Along the way, we discover culinary genius and decadent spa treatments in rural outposts. We cap the day with a tasting at Etta Place Cidery (ettaplacecider.com) in Torrey, Utah, a gateway town to Capitol Reef. In a back room hidden behind an 8-foot-high “Zion Wall,” owner Ann Torrence offers precise 1-ounce pours of the award-winning cider. We stay down the road at Skyview Hotel (skyviewtorrey.com), the brainchild of Joshua Rowley and Nicholas Derrick. It has 14 modern hotel rooms with Derrick’s artwork on the walls and six geodesic domes nearby for glamping. The hotel’s facade is defined by a curtain of rose-colored ropes undulating in the breeze, at once creating a shady walkway and an interactive art installation.

A private hot tub with a view at Red Sands Hotel in Torrey, Utah.

Both Capitol Reef and Bryce Canyon are International Dark Sky Parks, and in 2018, Torrey was designated as Utah’s first International Dark Sky community. On clear, moonless nights, the sky turns into a star-studded canvas. The hotel’s rooftop terrace is the perfect venue for stargazing. Better yet, bunk down in one of the geodesic domes with clear ceilings to watch the night sky sparkle.

After the high-octane adventure of the day, a visit to Torrey’s Red Sands Hotel & Spa (redsandshotel.com) is a welcome pause. The spa offers massages, facials and three ways to soak: a private hot tub, a copper tub with essential oils, or a salt oat. I choose to oat in warm water and 1,000 pounds of Epsom salts. It takes a while to relax, but when I do, it’s the most extraordinary feeling of weightlessness. Every muscle relaxes. Floating blissfully, I fall fast asleep.

Hickman Bridge in Capitol Reef National Park

Bryce Canyon National Park is up next, two hours south of Torrey. En route, we stop for lunch at Hell’s Backbone Grill (hellsbackbonegrill.com) in Boulder, Utah (population: 252). Chef-owners Jen Castle and Blake Spalding, along with their new executive chef, Tamara Stanger, draw on ingredients harvested from their 6-acre organic farm and orchards, from apricots and cherries to rhubarb and fresh herbs. Spalding shows us the asparagus spears growing in the garden; later, we will have the most delightful asparagus soup in mismatched teacups, garnished with a freshly picked honey locust blossom.

Next, we head for glamping outpost Under Canvas Bryce Canyon (undercanvas.com), where a collection of safari-style canvas tents are spread across 750 acres of juniper forest. When I zip open the tent flap, I’m delighted to find a king-size bed stacked with fluffy pillows, cowhide rugs, a private shower and wood-fired stove. Roughing it means getting up at midnight to stoke the stove. At night, we gather around the fire pit for s’mores and red wine.

Under Canvas has a new glamping outpost near Bryce Canyon

Bryce Canyon National Park is a 15-minute drive from Under Canvas. At 35,835 acres, the park is small compared with other national parks, but it packs in incredible views, including the world’s largest concentration of hoodoos in Bryce Amphitheater. In 1923, President Warren G. Harding established Bryce as a national monument, so our trip coincides with the park’s centennial. After a day of e-biking through the park, we return in the evening to watch a concert staged on the canyon’s lip. Cello music fills the air, but the sun setting in hues of pink and purple over the red rocks is the real showstopper.