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Located just minutes from Saint George, Snow Canyon State Park is the third largest state park in our Utah state parks system. Tucked amid lava flows and soaring sandstone cliffs this 7,400-acre scenic park was named not after the white fluffy stuff, but prominent pioneers Lorenzo and Erastus Snow.
(Kristen Comella, Snow Canyon State Park Manager) Because of the amazing climate we have down here in Southern Utah we are a year round operation. For not only our trails, but also our camp ground.
(Kristen Comella) We have over 38 miles of hiking trails in the park. We have horseback riding, mountain biking. We have over a hundred eighty technical climbing routes. We also have canyoneering that is available with our on-line canyoneering permit and then we have a 33 unit campground.
(Kristen Comella) Two of those are group sites, available for groups from 35-55 people. We have 14 hookup sites for motor homes or RV. Those have water and electric which is 30 amp and then we have a central dump station and then the remainder of our sites are tent sites or non-hookup sites.
(Kristen Comella) There is incredible opportunity here at Snow Canyon and even more basic than all of those outdoor activities for people that love beautiful scenery and nature watching this is the place to come.
(Kristen Comella - Snow Canyon State Park Manager) A really fun hike here in the park that's really good for all ages. Snow Canyon State Park has a vast network of hikes, but this trail stands out for its volcanic past.
(Kristen) It's about 1 mile one way and that actually connects with the Lava Flow trail.
(Ron Goodin - Hiker) Its a fun little place to come on short hikes if you don't want to waste a whole day hiking.
(Kristen) One of the nice things about it is you start off you actually cross a little bit of the slick rock and some of the neat red sandstone formations that we have here in the park.)
(Kristen)The trail drops down just a short elevation drop and you're actually on the edge of a big sandstone formation with lava flow off to the other side.>
But the coolest geology lesson on this hike is the ancient lava tubes you can crawl around in. There are two lava tubes in the park, that visitors can actually climb down into. 28,000 years ago, a volcano eruption created the tubes, which have been exposed over time.
(Sage Goodin - Hiker) It's really dark and skinny and you have to scale these really slippery rocks. And then it goes down under that way. It's fun, it's great, it's like less walking, well, depending on where you go we did less walking and more climbing in the tubes, which is funner for us.
(Jared Hargrave - KSL Outdoors Producer) If you come to the lava tubes, make sure you have a headlamp or flashlight, it's really dark in here, you're going to need them.
