Leprechaun Canyon, Hanksville

Amazing!!!! But I’d recommend mark the parking lot 38°01'03.9"N 110°32'14.9"W beforehand, because we initially parked at a wrong parking lot. Family friendly and hiking is easy.

Really fun and easy to hike slot canyon but it can be a bit hard to find. The parking is basically just along the dirt road off the main highway. There is really no signage from the road to indicate you are there from the road. It is just a simple dirt road on the east side of the road. Our navigation stopped working about 10 miles before we got here so we drove past it 2 times before we finally guessed the right turn off. If you remember that it is about 400 feet south beyond mile marker 28 you will be good. For the first half of the trail, and due to there being no signs from there road and non working navigation we were wondering if we were even in the right place. You walk along a river bottom that is super sandy. We went with our 3, 5 and 7 year old kids and explored the canyons. As you hike up, you will see a canyon that goes off to the left. We didn't get far with our kids on that one. We only went about 50 yards. The most fun for us was the middle slot canyon as you continue east on the trail. The tiny slot isn't very long it is probably only 300 feet long and maybe 20 feet high and it gradually gets more and more narrow and goes up hill. Out of the 5 of us I was the only one that made it all the way to the end and had to take of my backpack to squeeze through the final stretch. and was able to ultimately climb out on top of the slot where I could look down on my family still in the slot. Once on top of the slot is narrow enough that you can easily jump back and forth between the 2 sides of the slot and I used this to record some video of my kids and wife turning around and exiting the slot to the west. From there, it was easy for me to walk along the top of the slot all the way back to the entrance and it was easy to climb back down. Once you have explored that slot, there is rock you climb on to the south side of the entrance of the slot to go deeper into the canyon. This part of the canyon feels a lot like the Subway in Zion as you have cliffs that are narrow at the top on both sides that gradually bow outward and round toward the floor of the canyon. The shape looks like one of the leaves on a shamrock so I wonder if that is why the canyon has it's name. After a few hundred yards of immense canyon, it again narrows into a 100 foot tall slot canyon. I am 6' 4" and at the most narrow my shoulders were just barely rubbing against both sides of the wall. This part of the canyon was dark. Very little light gets in from the top at this point but you can still see all the way up. You don't need a flashlight but it is pretty cool. After you climb over a boulder wedged in the canyon, you can then see the light again. We were able to continue about up another 75 feet before we hit a fork in the canyon. We explored up right fork but got could do no further once we hit an area that had a 10 foot cliff we could not get on top of. While there, we saw some people climbing down in full climbing gear. There is so much more to see here than we saw if you have the right gear and skills to do it. Really, a super cool and relatively unknown spot that is a really fun adventure. If you found this review helpful, please click "Like" below.