Snow Canyon State Park

Contrary to its name, winter visitors will rarely find any "white stuff" at this 7,400-acre desert park. Named after Lorenzo and Erastus Snow, early Utah leaders, Snow Canyon offers 16 miles of hiking trails, technical rock climbing, horseback riding, year-round camping, nature studies, wildlife viewing, and photographic opportunities galore. All of this is set against a stunning backdrop of towering sandstone cliffs in red and white, and peaks and valleys of jumbled black lava rock interspersed with serpentine sandy washes.

Snow Canyon is named after early Mormon settlers Lorenzo and Erastus Snow. It was designated as a Utah State Park in 1958. Two canyons, West Canyon and Snow Canyon, begin side-by-side at the north gouging deeply into the sandstone of the Red Mountains, each canyon then running southward, slowly converging then finally meeting in the middle of the park.

From there Snow Canyon continues south-by-southeastward as a single, larger canyon. Near the park's southern entrance, the canyon ends, its mouth opening out onto the Santa Clara bench near Ivins, Utah. Red rock formations add to the beauty of the canyon. A paved two-lane road (formerly SR-300) enters the park from Ivins on the south, winds up the canyon a ways, then climbs up the eastern edge to the bench above Snow Canyon, where the road joins State Route 18. Ancient lava flows spill over the eastern edges of Snow Canyon from above, where the road climbs out of the canyon. The park boundaries extend northeastward, across State Route 18, to encompass two cinder cones along the western edge of Diamond Valley. The highest point in the park, according to a U.S. Geological Survey topographical map, is a peak 5,024 feet in elevation nearly due west of the southern cinder cone, standing above the eastern edge of the east fork of Snow Canyon.