Parking
Use the Dead Horse Point State Park Visitor Center parking area. Start on the path behind the center, cross the park road, and follow the campground’s north side toward West Rim.
Overview
About Shafer Canyon Overlook Trail
Why go
- A first view of the Colorado River far below the west rim.
- A cairned slickrock route with a strong canyon payoff.
Heads up
- Cairns can be hard to spot on open rock, and most overlook edges are unfenced.
Map & elevation
The route
Loading the Dead Horse Point map
Full mapElevation5,891–5,983 ft
Plan your hike
Before you go
Parking
Safety
The highest, rockiest slopes around here are a summer buffet for grizzly bears.
Dead Horse Point Tour Guide
Your drive to Shafer Canyon Overlook Trail, narrated.
Parkwolf is a GPS audio tour guide for Dead Horse Point State Park. As you drive, it chimes in with what’s ahead: hidden gems, upcoming stops, history, geology, and wildlife, right through your car’s speakers.
Recorded for this trailhead
Visitor Center Rim Trails0:00 / 0:24
“You're nearing the visitor center's rim-trail access, where the East and West Rim trails make a half-day loop to Dead Horse Point.”
Plays as you drive up to this trailhead in the Parkwolf Dead Horse Point Tour Guide.
More stories near here in the app
- Visitor Center and Desert View
- Kayenta Campground
- Wingate Campground and Yurts
- Dead Horse Point Overlook
- 11 audio storiesacross Dead Horse Point’s roads, triggered by GPS as you drive
- Wildlife heatmapsfor Raven, Whiptail Lizard, Fence Lizard, and 1 more
- Works offlinemaps, 21 trails, 22 places, and audio download before you lose signal
- CarPlay readysimple controls built for the drive
“Fantastic app with many points of information… It’s great to just turn on while you’re driving and it gives you an audio tour of the national Park. We love it!!!!”
Trail guide
Hiking Shafer Canyon Overlook Trail
The walkThe 3.
The 3.3-mile out-and-back starts at the Visitor Center, follows the West Rim Trail, then branches to Shafer Canyon Overlook. Allow about two hours. The grade is mostly gentle and undulating, but the tread is uneven sandstone and slickrock, and parts of the rim are exposed. It’s a good choice for a moderate-length canyon walk if you’re comfortable watching your footing near open edges.
Finding the overlookStart on the path behind the Visitor Center, cross the park road, and continue along the north…
Start on the path behind the Visitor Center, cross the park road, and continue along the north side of the campground to the West Rim. Cairns mark the primitive route across bare rock; they can be easy to lose against the view, so pause at junctions and check that you’re still following the west-rim line. Continue past Rim Overlook to the Shafer spur, then return the same way.
The canyon viewShafer Canyon Overlook gives the route its payoff: a first glimpse of the Colorado River…
Shafer Canyon Overlook gives the route its payoff: a first glimpse of the Colorado River roughly 2,000 feet below the rim. Most overlooks here are unfenced. For a phone photo, keep a strip of nearby rock in the frame with the river far below; it makes the depth easier to read. Stay well back from the edge.
A deep cut through timeThe Colorado River has cut through roughly 300 million years of rock here.
The Colorado River has cut through roughly 300 million years of rock here. Entrada Sandstone caps the visible sequence, with older layers descending toward the Honaker Trail Formation at river level. The bands began as sediments laid down by ancient oceans, lakes, streams, and windblown dunes; later erosion carved the canyon walls and mesas.
Wildlife
Wildlife in Dead Horse Point
33 sightingsRavenMost seen around 6 PMSighting map
16 sightingsWhiptail LizardMost seen around 10 AMSighting map
34 sightingsFence LizardMost seen around 8 AMSighting map
42 sightingsSide-blotched LizardMost seen around 9 AMSighting mapSighting maps show where each species has been reported across Dead Horse Point. Wildlife moves, so no sighting is guaranteed.
