- Distance: 60.8 Miles (97.85 km)
- Rating: 4-D, Once a dirt road that now gets a little bit more asphalt every year, its narrow and rough, but offers some very technical, narrow corners. Ratings Explained »
- Travel: Either direction for best results
- Start: Boulder, Utah
- End: Boulder, Utah
- Fuel: Boulder, Utah
- Along the Way: Hells Backbone Grill in Boulder Utah is one of our favorite eateries in the state. During the first few miles there are some fantastic view points that are worth stopping at.
- Highlights: This road is all about the views, riding down narrow slot canyons in a world too inhospitable to support human life, you wonder how the vegetation survives
- Advisories: This is an out and back unless you fancy riding in the dirt, expect sand to have washed or blown onto the road surface and if its raining anticipate the potential for flash flooding. The road is narrow so be prepared for oncoming traffic to taking up the full width of the road.
View Larger Map of the Burr Trail
Summary
If you have the time and find yourself wanting more epic, desert scenery, then this road is one not to be avoided. On most days, particularly mid-week, you can almost plan on being the only one out there. Even on busy weekends it can be eerily quiet.
Leaving Boulder, Utah and riding east, the road quickly leaves behind the few homesteads in the area and enters into a very empty landscape, bountiful with towering rock features. The road starts dropping down into narrow canyons by clinging to impossibly narrow ledges that switchback their way down to the narrow valley floor. From here the scenery gets really good.
Sheer red rock walls climb several hundred feet up towards the crisp blue, Utah skies creating stunning color contrast while the road snakes its way between the empty creek bed (unless its raining) and the steep rock walls. Few pullouts offer photo vantages, but the quiet, remote nature of the road means you can stop most anywhere as long as you are smart enough to not park in a blind corner.
After several more miles, the road will look like it ends at a cattle-guard and a wide gravel parking lot. Stop to enjoy the views overlooking Capital Reef National Park in the distance, but you can continue on for another 15 miles (or so) before the road terminates at the parks boundary. At this point most asphalt intended bikes turn around and enjoy the road in the other direction, but those unintimidated by graded dirt roads can press forth. If you turn around, you will be amazed that the same place can look so different from two directions.
Do you have a better photograph of this Road?
If you do, email us your photograph and if we use it, you could win the Ultimate Collectors Edition of Faster, Faster and Faster and The Doctor, the Tornado and The Kentucky Kid a $40 value that has the Directors Cut of all three movies, remastered in 5.1 digital surround sound! More than seven hours of content!
Email photos to contest at canyonchasers.net with the name of the road in the subject line. (Or just click on that link and we'll fill in the subject line for you.)
Rate This Road
Have you ridden this road? How would you rate it? With one star meaning you thought this was a super-lame road with very little value, to five stars meaning that you felt like this was the mother of all roads - a road by which other roads should be judged.
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Ratings Explained
The CanyonChasers road rating is two parts. The first part, numbers 1 through 5, describe how technical the road is, with number 1 being a gently sweeping road and number five being very technical with challenging corners. The second part of the rating is a letter, A, B, C, D and F. The letter describes the quality of the road surface with A being perfect, pristine smooth and F being degraded, bumpy and crumbly. Rolling joints, tar-stips or "gummy worms" will drop the road one letter grade.
This road information is for planning and recreational purposes only. You may find that construction projects, traffic, or other events may cause road conditions to differ from the CanyonChasers ratings. Ratings may not be applicable to all riders, all bikes and all skill levels.