A Fiery Furnace

October 19, 2021 by Amy Welborn

One of the more well-known hikes in Arches National Park is the “Fiery Furnace.” It’s a tight formation of fins and such that’s somewhat of a maze. You must have a permit to hike there, and they only make a few dozen available every day – and they must be reserved online. Before Covid, they did ranger-led tours as well, and I hope they’ll begin again next spring – but for now, you’re on your own.

And of course, since there are so few permits given every day, it’s a race. Reservations for permits can be made no earlier than seven days before the desired date, and they are released at 10 am eastern time on that date – and they’re gone before a minute has passed.

We decided this was a hike we wanted to do, so now it was time to practice!

No, not walking or scaling sliprock – but refreshing the recreation.gov page at exactly 9am our time and getting in there and getting that permit.

So, yes, every morning for a week, there I was on the computer at the designated time – the first couple of days I missed it, but then my technique improved and I was fake-snagging those permits with ease. (And releasing them a moment later, hopefully giving joy to some slowpoke out there).

At the same time, I was also practicing and trying to get tour tickets for Mesa Verde – for all tours except the Long House, it’s the same issue, especially since the Cliff House is closed – the Square House and the Mug House only have a few dozen spots every day for tours. I did get tickets for the Mug House tour eventually, but then when our plans changed, had to return them – for an almost-full refund (minus a $2 service fee or something).

So, permit reservation in hand for today, Tuesday, on Monday afternoon, after we were done with the Devil’s Garden and whatever else we did that day, we stopped by the visitor’s center to pick up the permits – and, as it turned out, get oriented. The ranger took all of our information, filled out tags for our cars and for our packs, then trotted us into a room to watch a video on Safety! and Take Care of the Nature! and It’s Not a Toilet Down There!

Fully oriented, off we went.

Because parking at this lot isn’t an issue as it is in the others, we didn’t need to get there *quite* so early, but we did want to avoid the big, slow (How much is it? Oh, I can get an annual pass? How much is that? Well, that sounds like a good deal – should we get the annual pass, Ted? Well, I don’t know – do you think we’ll go to another park this year? Oh yes, we’re seniors. We can get a special pass? Ted, should we get an annual or lifetime pass? Ted, can you get out the credit card? ……) line at the gate, so we settled on a departure/checkout time of 6:45, getting us there – after a stop for a Diet Coke and a milk – around 7:15. Already piling up!

We weren’t in any hurry, so we decided to park and hike around the Windows area – taking the back-end “primitive” trail. It was lovely. Lots of folks with tripods on all sides, of course, catching that early morning sun.

Then to the Fiery Furnace!

The difficulty is a little oversold, but that’s fine. That, along with the permit system, works against the place being overrun by 12-year olds in flip-flops.

We got very turned around at the beginning despite my having downloaded the trail map on the AllTrails app. It was sort of ridiculous, but in the process, M did find what looked to be a snake-feeding spot – he found some bones and some snake defecation which he picked apart (with a stick) and in which he found more bones.

(Yes, he knows about snakes – we used to have one.)

But we eventually found our way to the proper trail (obviously), and climbed, scrambled and slid our way in and around the fins and towers.

It took a lot longer than we thought – mostly because of that initial confusion – but it was fine. We ate lunch up at the Panorama Point viewpoint, then got in the car, said farewell to Arches – a lovely, lovely park – a favorite now – and made our way south to the Needles area of Canyonlands.

Left: LaSal Mountains; Right: Balancing Rock & other formations…can’t remember the area.

First stop was here – we did get out of the car, but didn’t take any tours – they were giving one when we arrived, and we didn’t feel like waiting. What is it? A 5000-square foot house dug out of the sandstone back in the 1950’s – with a bust of FDR carved in the front for good measure.

Then down to Canyonlands with no more stops because someone fell asleep. The drive into the park from the main road is long – over thirty miles – but it’s simply gorgeous. Canyonlands is, in a way, like the Grand Canyon, only spread out. We did a few viewpoints and the short but interesting Cave Spring Hike – just around and above a series of caves and overhangs near a spring used over the centuries by Native Americans, and then cowboys, up until the 1970’s, when they stopped using the area as a cattle range.