Valley of Fire State Park
Opened in 1934, Valley of Fire State Park is the oldest state park in Nevada. Only an hour’s drive outside of Las Vegas, there’s enough here for a full day trip. We did about three hikes (Fire Wave and Seven Wonders loop, White Domes Loop, and Mouse’s Tank), with just enough time to drive around and hit the rest of the sites before heading home.
There is a small fee for entering the park which differs between Nevada residents and visitors. Oh, and bring your own water.
We started out early to take advantage of the cooler temperatures before the afternoon desert heat kicked in. Our first hike was one of the more popular hikes: the Fire Wave.
In spring, the desert flowers were in full bloom which brought pops of pinks, reds, and yellows into our hikes. The most brilliant of these were the cacti.
The Fire Wave can either be an out-and-back trail , or there’s an option to continue on and make a loop through Pink Canyon and the Seven Wonders and ending back at the same parking lot. The map says in and back was 1.3 miles, and the full loop was 1.8 miles, but it felt much longer.
Since we decided to continue on, we eventually made it to the Pink Canyon which had some beautiful striations in the rocks. Despite the fact that we were going through a canyon (a shallow one, to be fair), most of this hike was in the open sun with very little shade.
Two things to note in this image. One, is the combination of yellow and pink rock. And two, the very very handy yellow trail markers to let us know we were on the right track.
Another popular hike is the White Domes Loop which starts at a different parking spot. It looks like a shorter loop on the map, but what the map doesn’t show is the elevation. The hike begins with a bit of a steep descent (look for the people in the image for scale).
At the bottom of the canyon is an old movie set, but the highlight for us on the White Domes Loop was the slot canyon.
But even as we made our way out of the canyon and back to the parking lot, there was still lots of great views to take in.
This is Mouse’s Tank road (more on Mouse later) which is the main artery that leads through the park. There’s a really great spot (made popular by Instagrammers) opposite and a little ways south from the Rainbow Vistas parking lot to get a great view of the red sandstone formations made from ancient sand dunes.
Mouse’s Tank hike is one of three spots in the park where petroglyphs can be found. They are mostly on the left hand side, looking up. The black coloring is called “desert varnish”.
Mouse was an outlaw in the 1930’s who hid out in the canyons and survived by drinking rainwater from this small reservoir now know as Mouse’s tank. For us modern day folk, we had to bring in our own water or choose to fill up at the tap outside of the Visitor’s Center.
There are a number of famous rock formations in the park. Elephant rock can easily be seen from the road (when heading in the right direction). We completely missed on the drive by and almost left the park. We had to double back, drive to the parking lot, and follow the “path” for a quick walk.
These cabins were built in the 1930’s for travelers passing through the park. No one was there when we were there, but they are pretty cozy with sturdy roofs and built in fireplaces inside.
Near the entrance to the park is a loop that leads to several rock formations like Arch rock, the Beehives, and Atlatl Rock.
But what is at the top of the Atlatl staircase? 4000 year old petroglyphs showing people using a tool called the Atlatl that launched spears, and a stunning view overlooking the area.