Big Ridge - Garfield CO Utah

The Big Ridge OHV trail will take you on a remote desert drive riding among buttes, canyons, and on top of benches with views that are hard to describe with words or pictures. We hope this will give you a good preview of a great trail for experienced riders, and we would strongly suggest taking some friends along and letting those at home know where you are going. Walking out of this area really isn’t an option, and it is remote.

The start of this ride is just past the Hite marina and campground, right next to the Colorado River. We spent nine hours riding the trail for over 100 miles at approximately 12 mph. You will want to plan on a long day out to allow for plenty of time for getting back. Camping is available at the Hite Marina campground. There is also a small service station in Hite where you can stop to grab gas and a snack before you head out for the day.

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Directions From the North
Directions from the South
Facilities: No Facilities on the trail. Fuel, food and lodging in nearby Hanksville
OHVs: ATVs, MCs, UTVs, High Clearance 4x4s on most trails. Riding is restricted to designated trails. Street-legal OHVs required if driving on trails in the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area.
Terrain: Sandy backcountry trail, some rocky areas, steep grades
Signage: BLM Route Markers and Carsonites / well-marked
KML File for Google Maps
GPX File for your Garmin GPS or other apps
Closest medical facilities are in Richfield or Moab. Utah Highway Patrol: Dial 9-1-1. We highly recommend you purchase a Utah Search and Rescue Assistant Card (USARA), learn more: https://secure.utah.gov/rescue/
NATIONAL PARK SERVICES: General Information: 928.608.6200 Bullfrog Ranger Station: (435) 684.7400 Emergency: (928) 608-6300 Emergency: (800) 582-4351
Garfield Sheriff’s Office Search and Rescue • (435) 676-2678
Emergencies: Wayne County Sheriff • (435) 836-1308

GAIA

We highly recommend you get GAIA GPS for your mobile device. GAIA GPS will allow you to download this trail complete with the photos you see here so you can be sure where you are at all times. Simply install the GAIA GPS app and save this trail from the button below.

Would you like to see the trail in an animated 3D flyover map? If it appears to pause, that is likely a place I stopped for a while. It will continue, just wait a few moments. Link to 3D flyover.

Here is the 360 view at the trailhead. Feel free to tour around a bit inside Google Street Views. We have recorded the trail in 360 and it is now part of Google Street Views so you can take a virtual tour of the trail to see if it is for you. We’ve made it a bit easier to navigate, scroll down and you will see more 360 embedded tours as we encounter intersections, trail markers or interesting places along the trail.

On any image, you can click the ‘X’ in the upper right corner and the view will change to an overview map showing the Google Street View blue lines. You can click anywhere on that blue line and drop down to the 360 ground-level views at that point.

You can move the image 360 degrees, click the arrow to move further down the trail and zoom in and out to take a closer look. Clicking the box in the upper right-hand corner will enlarge to full screen for a better view.

There are a couple of signs with good information and maps at the start of the trail. We recommend stopping to check them out so you can be sure to follow the restrictions in the area.

The trail begins right off Highway 95 on NP633. The trail starts off with some well maintained dirt roads alongside these beautiful red rock cliffs. You can see as we go along the terrain changes. You'll find some areas of the trail are rock. There are a lot of cool things to see along this trail. You can rotate this 360 view to get an idea of what type of scenery to expect on this ride. We take off to the right here, a left will take you up a small canyon to a dead end. You'll reach this intersection, but as you can see your only option is to take a left if you are in an OHV. The trail is positioned just next to the Fiddler Butte Wilderness Study Area. As always, be sure to be respectful of the land. This is a view of Gunsight Butte. We are coming up on Sunset Pass Campsite. Permits are required for camping so plan ahead if you'd like to stay overnight. We head off to the right here. A left would take you to the Poison Spring Trail. The road is pretty good overall but there may be segments that get washed out and you'll want to hug the inside of the road if you're afraid of heights. Grand views as you climb out of the canyon into the benches. We take a left here. Here we are at Two Pipe Springs. This is where we turned around to make the trail an out and back. It is an incredible view from the top of this bench.