Login | July 13, 2026
Bucket list hike - Buckskin Gulch
PETE GLADDEN
Published: July 13, 2026
For you hiking/backpacking enthusiasts, I’m going to attempt to plant an idea in your brain that I’m hoping will germinate into reality.
So sit down, relax, and let that adventurous side of yourself absorb the picture I’m about to paint.
You’re trekking through one of the world’s longest and deepest hikeable slot canyons, a giant chasm that contains towering 300-500-foot walls which are so high they nearly obscure the azure blue sky.
The slot you’re hiking through feels alien, exotic and exhilarating as you squeeze through narrow spaces, amble through cavernous amphitheater-like chambers, scramble across giant boulders and wade through cool, waist-deep waters, all the while marveling at the hypnotically beautiful play of light when it splashes across the majestic sandstone walls creating these massively long, luminous brushstrokes of phosphorescent reds and browns.
That picture is an actual trek through the incredible 12-mile long Buckskin Gulch slot canyon, an unfathomably unique slot that straddles the Arizona-Utah border, and a bucket list, once-in-a-lifetime outdoor adventure that’s simply off the charts amazing.
The Buckskin Gulch slot is a hike I did some 13 years ago, and it was such a breathtaking, fast-forward day that I still have a never-ending video of it looping through my brain.
So the Buckskin Gulch slot is part of the Paria Canyon-Vermilion Cliffs Wilderness, and back when we did the hike this was an off-the-beaten-track place.
Well, the Buckskin Gulch secret got out years ago such that today there’s a $6/person day use pass required to enter.
Okay, so the logistics on this hiking/backpacking trip are a bit involved, so let me go over two of the most essential.
1) You’ll need to purchase a day pass/backpacking permit through a BLM (Bureau Of Land Management) website specific to this hiking area: https://www.recreation.gov/activitypass/10006175).
From there you simply print out your pass or write your confirmation PASS ID on the fee envelope at the trailhead and display it on your vehicle's dashboard.
2) This is a crazy long - and uninterrupted - slot canyon so you have to be totally dialed into the area’s weather forecast.
Thus, if there’s a chance of rain within even 100 miles of the canyon, DO NOT do the hike.
The Buckskin Gulch slot is a very dangerous place to be (often called the worst slot in the US to get caught in a flashflood) when there’s rain anywhere in the general region.
What’s more, the hike itself has a few logistical intricacies to consider.
Your starting point is the Wire Pass Trailhead (TH), located on House Rock Valley Road in Southern Utah.
Now whether you’re doing this as a one-day thru hike as we did, or as a two-day backpacking trip, know that it’s 21 long and arduous point-to-point miles, and as such you’ll need one vehicle parked at the Wire Pass TH and another parked at the Whitehouse TH - or you can prearrange a shuttle service.
The shuttle service is: https://www.seekingtreasureadventures.com/buckskin-gulch-paria-canyon-shuttles.
From the Wire Pass TH here’s some ancillary hiking prior to actually getting into Buckskin Gulch, and then once you get to the gulch you’ll be hiking in a super wide, expansive canyon where there’s a host of Indian petroglyphs.
And this is where the magic begins because at that point the canyon walls are 300 feet high, and the further in you hike the higher those walls get.
Once you’re firmly inside this monster the walls can ebb and flow with respect to the corridor’s narrowness, going from mammoth chambers to skinny, 5-foot wide squeeze passages, and it continues in this manner for the next 12 miles!
Closer to the end, at the confluence of the Paria River, you could easily be hiking in cold, waist-deep water.
Then at the Paria River you hike upstream to the Whitehouse TH.
Whether day hiking or backpacking the totality of Buckskin Gulch you’ll need the following: 30 feet of rope (in case the pre-installed ropes and ladders have been washed away from flash flooding); ample food & water; quality hiking boots and socks; and maybe even some junky tennis shoes or sturdy sandals for the water hiking portions.
So to all you adventurous souls…Buckskin Gulch is calling!
Pete can be reached at pjgladd@aol.com.