Walking in the Forest of Hoodoos - Queens Garden and Navajo Trails at Bryce Canyon

A park ranger will tell that you look down into the canyon from the rim at Bryce Canyon, and you look up from the canyon in Zion. Many visitors will stay above the Bryce Canyon. But hiking into the canyon will give one a totally different perspective and vista. Bryce Canyon offers several day-hiking trails. Because many of these are interconnected, the popular hikes are combinations of two or more of these basic trails.

The most popular combination 3 mile trail in the park is the combination of Queens Garden trail and Navajo Trail - claim to be the best 3 mile trail in the park. It is best to hike this loop trail clock wise - starting at Queen's Garden near Sunrise point, to hike down into the canyon, and to hike up to the trail head of Navajo trail near Sunset point, and continuation along the rim trail from Sunset point to Sunrise point closes the loop. It  is very steep near the Navajo trail head, and thus it is easier to hike up than hike down.

We hiked on these two trails in the afternoon of our second day at Bryce Canyon, after we cross-country skied along the east rim in the morning. It took us about 3 hours to complete the loop because we stopped constantly to enjoy and capture the beautiful hoodoos and spires at a leisure pace. 

trail map

Trail near Queen's Garden trail head - easy

Hoodoos

On Queen's Garden trail

Forest of Hoodood

Natural Gate

balance rock

Two bridges

View of Amphitheater on Navajo trail (near trail head)