Utah has 67 stone spires found nowhere else on Earth — and almost no one stops here

It’s 20 miles from Bryce Canyon

Most people driving Utah’s Scenic Byway 12 make a beeline for Bryce Canyon and never look back.

But 20 miles southeast, a paved road from the tiny town of Cannonville drops you into a 2,240-acre basin sitting at 5,800 feet in Garfield County.

Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument wraps around it on all sides. The crowds thin out fast here, and the reason to stop gets stranger the deeper you go.

National Geographic gave it a camera’s name

Back in 1948, a National Geographic Society expedition came through, snapped photographs, and walked away so impressed they named the place Kodachrome Flat after Kodak’s famous color film.

The landscape earned it. When Utah made it a state park in 1962, they called it Chimney Rock State Park.

Kodak got nervous about the trademark, but eventually gave permission, and the name stuck. Gates open year-round from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m.

Stone spires that exist almost nowhere else

Sixty-seven monolithic sandstone spires rise from the basin floor, and geologists call them sedimentary pipes.

You won’t find formations like these anywhere else on the planet. Some stand just six feet tall. Others reach 170 feet.

Layers of red, cream and white sandstone stack through each one, and the colors shift as the sun moves across the sky.

Morning light and late afternoon give you two completely different parks.

Hot springs built these rocks 180 million years ago

The exposed rock here spans from the middle Jurassic Period to the Cretaceous, roughly 180 million to 95 million years ago.

Geologists think this basin once looked a lot like Yellowstone, full of hot springs and geysers pumping through the ground. Sediment filled those geysers and hardened into solid columns.

Then the softer Entrada sandstone around them wore away over millions of years, leaving the harder spires standing alone like teeth in an old jaw.

Chimney Rock rises 170 feet from a flat meadow

The tallest spire in the park stands about 170 feet high in the middle of a wide, open meadow.

You can reach Chimney Rock by a short gravel road inside the park, and you’ll spot it long before you get there.

It shows up in the background of half the photos people take here. Pull over, walk up close, and look straight up.

The scale only hits you when you’re standing at the base.

The Panorama Trail packs six miles of surprises

If you only hike one trail, make it the Panorama. The short loop runs three miles.

The full loop stretches to six. Along the way, you pass the Ballerina Spire, a formation that looks like a foot balanced en pointe.

The Hat Shop sits further on, where small spires wear flat sandstone slabs on top like caps. At Indian Cave, grooved handprints mark the cliff wall.

Panorama Point caps it off with a 360-degree view of the entire basin.

Cool Cave and Secret Passage hide on the loop

The full Panorama loop takes you into a box canyon where Cool Cave waits, a circular red rock chamber that drops the temperature on a hot day.

You duck inside, rest in the shade, and let your eyes adjust. Back on the trail, Secret Passage cuts through the slickrock as a narrow slot you squeeze through sideways.

Smooth, cone-shaped formations nearby make the whole stretch feel like you walked onto another planet.

Walk across a mesa on Angel’s Palace Trail

Angel’s Palace runs about 1.5 miles as a loop and climbs 150 feet above the basin floor. Once you reach the top, you walk across a flat mesa with views dropping away in every direction.

Spur trails lead to narrow overlooks where the rock falls off on both sides. The whole thing takes 30 to 60 minutes and ranks easy to moderate.

Hit it at sunrise or sunset when warm light turns the sandstone deep orange and gold.

Flat trails wind through box canyons

Not every hike here asks much of your legs.

The Grand Parade Trail runs 1.5 miles on flat ground through two box canyons with walls towering above you on both sides.

The Nature Trail is a half-mile ADA-accessible loop near the campground with signs covering plants, animals and geology. The Shakespeare Arch-Sentinel Trail goes 1.7 miles past the Sentinel Spire.

Shakespeare Arch itself collapsed in 2019 from natural erosion, but the views into Grand Staircase-Escalante keep the hike worth your time.

The Milky Way stretches right over your tent

After the sun drops, the park transforms. On clear nights, the Milky Way runs across the sky in a band so wide and bright it looks painted on.

Southern Utah ranks among the darkest sky areas in the continental United States, and Kodachrome Basin sits deep in that darkness.

Rangers lead stargazing programs and constellation tours during summer months, so you can learn what you’re looking at while you look at it.

Saddle up or bike the trails

You can cover the Panorama and Grand Parade trails on horseback through a park concessionaire, and mountain biking is allowed on both routes too.

The park runs multiple campgrounds with sites that include full hookups, plus two bunkhouse cabins if you want a roof overhead.

Keep your eyes open for mule deer, foxes, rabbits, canyon wrens, ravens and the occasional golden eagle overhead.

Photographers come back here again and again for the light.

Grosvenor Arch rises 150 feet just down the road

About 10 miles southeast of the park, Grosvenor Arch stands 150 feet tall inside Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

Two arches share one massive sandstone wall. The whole formation was named after Gilbert Hovey Grosvenor, a former National Geographic Society president.

A short paved sidewalk from the parking lot leads to the base, so it works for wheelchairs and strollers. The dirt road in handles most vehicles when dry, but skip it after rain.

Explore Kodachrome Basin State Park in Utah

You can see the park for yourself at Kodachrome State Park Road in Henrieville, Utah, about nine miles south of Cannonville off Scenic Byway 12.

The park stays open year-round from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. with no holiday closures. Day-use entry runs $10 per vehicle, and you can buy your pass online or at the gate.

Bryce Canyon, Grand Staircase-Escalante and Scenic Byway 12 are all within a short drive, so build in extra days if you can.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

Read more from this brand:

• Above Bryce Canyon, a Paiute-named amphitheater glows in four colors
• Utah’s most jaw-dropping overlook has no railings, no crowds, and a 1,000-foot drop
• Utah’s pink sand dunes move 50 feet a year, and you can sled down them