The Cedars

The Cedar Mountains are one of my favorite places to go for spring and fall excursions.

About 65 mi west of Salt Lake by car, the Cedars are a designated BLM wilderness area. The state of Utah normally opposes all wilderness, but the Cedars were approved as part of a sneaky scheme to prevent the Goshute Indian tribe from establishing a high level nuclear waste storage site on their tiny, isolated reservation in Skull Valley, on the east side of the Cedars.

The “cedars” in the name of the range are actually Utah junipers, which are in the cypress family. The Cedars are pretty much a monoculture — the only significant trees in the range are junipers. There are a few pinyon pines in the Lakeside Mountains to the north, but I have never seen a pine in the Cedars.

There are lots of fun things to see out here. Pronghorn hang out on the flanks of the range; look for them early and late in the day. A herd of wild horses resides in the high country and maintains a system of trails. The range has craggy, unexpected topography, and the washes often make bizarre zigzags or run over pour-offs. Most of the range is limestone, which forms cliffs and towers. There are a few outcroppings of black basalt, and there is an old aragonite mine that produces layered ivory slabs of calcium carbonate with yellow and red and gray colored stains.

There are a few annoyances in the Cedars. The foothills tend to have rather a lot of cattle, and cattle poop. On one hike, we encountered a stinky, bloated cow corpse lying next to the water at the Quincy Spring stock pond. Because of the cows and the wild horses, there occasionally are ticks, particularly in the spring. Make sure to do a tick check when you get home and have a shower. While the dirt roads are generally in good shape, one nasty exception is the east-side road across Skull Valley to Rydalch Canyon — it can be a bottomless pit of dust, a challenge even for 4WD. Even on the better-maintained roads, you need to watch out for ruts and washouts.

The best access to the Cedars is from the west side, the far side from Salt Lake. Take I-80 west to exit 56, signed for Aragonite. (Aragonite used to be a railroad siding on the south side of the freeway, many years ago. There were big piles of aragonite there, left behind from the time when the mine was active.) Go east (left) and then south on a paved road about 2.2 mi until you are almost at the gates to the toxic waste incinerator complex. Watch out for cows — they like to wander across the road here. Turn east (left) onto a well-graded, signed dirt road. In 1.3 mi, you will reach an intersection with the main west-side Cedars road; there is a large sign describing the wilderness area.

North Cedars Crags

North Cedars Loop

Hastings Pass

Peak 7100 Loop

Highpoint Loop

Tabby's Peak