I loved my AirBnB in the tiny town of Escalante: a small but beautiful trailer with all that I needed. The trailer is on a hill in a trailer park and its views are vast over the Utah deserts and high mountains. I watched a sunrise, then a sunset all from a little bench in front.

My first morning in the area, I drove about 7-8 miles down the Hole in the Wall road to Zebra / Tunnel slot canyons. The easy 7.5-mile loop takes you to some amazing desert cliffs, through a beautiful if super rocky Harris Wash first to the aptly named Zebra Slot – a spectacularly striped walls which are sometimes so close that you have to raise yourself up by pressing your arms against the two walls and get your legs over the narrows. A few times, you will need to climb up and over boulders. You will crawl through openings. All the while you will have the biggest grin. And after you finish and exit the canyon, you will curse the topography for not being able to go back to the beginning and do it all over again.

Tunnel Slot Canyon is much shorter but for a while the walls close above your head. Hence the name – Tunnel.

This is an absolute must if you are anywhere remotely near the area. Early morning may be best as it does get hot even in February.