Breakfast with the Dark Angel of Arches National Park

He was nice and interesting enough, but the best thing that came from my Bumble date in Moab, Utah, was his advice to visit the Dark Angel.

Not the DC Comics supervillain who battled Wonder Woman, or the genetically enhanced supersoldier played by Jessica Alba in an early 2000s TV series, but the 150-foot-tall spire of dark sandstone in Arches National Park.

Famous for its Delicate Arch that graces Utah license plates and a multitude of other items that promote the state, Arches National Park visitation grew by 74% between 2011 and 2021, peaking at 1.8 million people annually. That explosion of visitors led to congestion that the National Park Service (NPS) sought to relieve by enacting a timed entry system that requires you to purchase a ticket in advance from April 1 to July 6 and August 28 to October 31.

However, if you head into the park before 7:00 a.m. or after 4:00 p.m., no timed entry ticket is necessary. And since it was the heat of summer when I was remote working in Moab, that worked out perfectly for me to do morning and evening hikes, then tap away on my computer in the cute, and importantly air-conditioned, tiny cabin I’d booked through AirBnB.

So that’s how my next date in Moab came to be breakfast with the Dark Angel. 

She’s the sentinel keeping watch at the end of the Devils Garden Trail, a full round-trip of 7.9 mi (12.7 km), but an elevation change of just 286 ft (87 m). So while the NPS classifies it as a strenuous hike, it’s nothing like what I did in Bryce Canyon.

Devils Garden is located at the northern end of the park, 18 miles (28 km) from the entrance. Most people who make their way there don’t venture all the way out to Dark Angel. I probably wouldn’t have if my date had not recommended it. Many other great landmarks such as Landscape Arch and Double O Arch can be seen there while hiking half the distance.

The reward of pushing yourself a little further is the opportunity to feel like a high-wire walker atop the fins. 

A fin, in geological terms, is a narrow wall of hard sedimentary rock that remains standing after surrounding rock has eroded away along parallel joints or fractures. Fins are formed when a narrow butte or plateau develops many vertical, parallel cracks. Because Arches National Park is filled with sandstone, it is home to many fins in all stages of development, best illustrated in this photo.

Landscape Arch, the longest arch in North America, which I’d passed earlier on the trail, is actually inside of a fin itself and part of the whole erosion process that eventually creates hoodoos. But continuing on the entire Devils Garden Trail takes you up on top of the narrow rock wall fins.

It’s not for the faint of heart. NPS calls it a challenging hike that involves narrow ledges, steep exposures, uneven surfaces, rock scrambling, and very few trail markers. I called it exhilarating.

Once at the end of the trail, staring up in solitude at the proud spire of stone, I opened my backpack and enjoyed one of the best-tasting peanut butter sandwiches I’ve ever eaten.

Thanks, Bumble date whose name I can’t remember!

#NationalParkWeek