Coyote Buttes South and White Pocket
Coyote Buttes South and White Pocket, in the Vermillion Cliffs National Monument, are two beautiful and interesting remote back country destinations in a desert wilderness that relatively few get to experience.
Vermillion Cliffs, Utah -
2014
Lesser Known Places But Not Less Spectacular
In May 2014 we went to see Coyote Buttes South and a place a bit deeper into the Vermillion Cliffs known as White Pocket.
Coyote Buttes South is a slightly lesser version of the world famous Coyote Buttes North A.K.A ‘The Wave’
Both were spectacular sights to see and indicative of some of the strange formations that can be found in the red rock canyon country of southern Utah and northern Arizona.
I applied for a permit online for Coyote Buttes South in February, 2014, for May, and received it on the spot. Like Coyote Buttes North there is a online lottery but I received it immediately apparently because there wasn’t enough interest (for south) and there were permits left over from the lottery. One reason is that getting to Coyote Buttes South is a more difficult drive than Coyote Buttes North.
The reason it is more difficult is because you start by having to drive 12-
Once you navigated the trip down House Rock Valley Road and get to the turn off for Coyote Buttes South you will need a 4WD vehicle from there. The CB South trail head at Paw Hole is about 2.5 miles from House Rock Valley Road. The more interesting part of Coyote Buttes South is the trail head at Cottonwood Cove -
For those unfamiliar or even curious about the lottery system for Coyote Buttes (north and south) there's a link at the bottom of the page to the Recreation.gov website with all the information that you need. Suffice to say that only 64 people a day are permitted to go to Coyote Buttes North (The Wave) and 20 people a day to Coyote Buttes South. There is an online lottery for both. For CB North they now, as of 2021, allow 64 people a day with 48 permits given out by the online lottery and 16 permits available at the BLM office in Kanab, Utah, for the next day. For CB South there still are only 20 permits with 10 available online and 10 available at the BLM office for the next day. The CB South lottery is for 3 months hence i.e. in June they allow you to select dates for the month of September and notifications for September ‘winners’ go out on July 1st. You cannot select any dates beyond 3 months ahead but you can, if any dates are still available, select dates for months prior to that.
No permit is required for White Pocket. This is deeper into the Vermillion Cliffs and more difficult to get to and relatively few people go there.
Along with the permit for Coyote Buttes South the BLM sent a map of the area. Looking at the map I noticed that there were warnings about deep sand. Generally I like to drive the back country myself but having gotten stuck in the sand at Canyon de Chelly, and not being able to find enough information as to exactly how much sand there was to deal with, and how steep the hills were, my wife lobbied hard to have somebody else do the driving and I (grudgingly) consented. Had I only been going to Coyote Buttes South I might have done the driving but I was also going to White Pocket, which is that much further into the Vermilion Cliffs back country, so I contacted Dreamland Safari Tours and booked a tour for my wife and I (you still are required to have a Coyote Buttes South permit for the tour). As of 2021, Dreamland no longer offers the combined tour due to the amount of time needed to reach both venues. You can get a tour to either one instead.
They picked us up in the morning and proceeded to head south, out of Kanab, towards the Grand Canyon North Rim and headed east on US 89A at Jacob’s Lake. About an hour after we left Kanab we reached House Rock Valley Road which, when not wet, is a fairly good graded road into the Vermilion Cliffs area. We turned off US 89A and stopped for a rest stop and to survey our surroundings. At that point the driver let some of the air out of the tires to soften the ride and also to make navigating through the sand easier. We were in a big SUV with another couple and our driver.
We wound our way along multiple dirt roads past several ranches and about an hour later reached the White Pocket parking area. We parked and walked about 100 yards or so into White Pocket. This is an area with the most bizarre sandstone formations I’ve ever seen. I saw a picture in a restaurant of an odd but beautiful looking place and I asked the owner where it was. He told me it was a place called White Pocket and it wasn't easy to get to. He was right about that but the trip was worth it. We really were in quite a strange place. It was unlike anything I had ever seen. I've spent many weeks driving up and down the local roads in southern Utah and Northern Arizona, rented jeeps and drove them into the back country, hiked some interesting trails but I've never seen anything that looked like this. You can look at the sandstone in places like the Wave, or Coyote Buttes South, and it looks like a petrified sand dune. While White Pocket has some of that, most of White Pocket has sandstone formations that kind of look like they were churned up and petrified. It’s a mix of odd shapes and color like nothing you've ever seen before. The entire area is probably less than one square mile and there's nothing like it anywhere around it. It's hard to even imagine how it was formed.
We spent the better part of two hours hiking around the area taking pictures, marveling at the sights, and just loving every second of being there. And one of the best things about being out there is that there were hardly any other people. You could marvel at what was before your eyes, photograph it, and sit there alone engulfed in it.
This is definitely a place that I do plan to get back to and spend more time exploring.
From there we had about a good hour's drive to Coyote Buttes South. This was the part that warned of deep sand on the map that the BLM sent me with my permit. The map had a warning that travel was not recommended on that part of the road. For our experienced driver, with the right equipment, it was not a problem. By coming in from the south and going to White Pocket first we were driving through the sand in the downhill direction which is that much easier than going uphill.
We reached the Coyote Buttes South area and parked the car. From where the car was parked it's about a 1/2 mile hike to get to the Cottonwood Cove part of Coyote Buttes South. This is the more scenic part. The part that is easier to get to from House Rock Valley Road is called Paw Hole and it's not as dramatic as at Cottonwood Cove.
We hiked about 2 1/2 miles around the formations of Coyote Buttes South. Our guide led us through some very interesting and dramatic scenery. There were even some 75 million year old dinosaur tracks. Without a guide it was easy to see how somebody could get lost out here -
After leaving Cottonwood, on the way back to House Rock Valley Road, we stopped at the Paw Hole area. It was a short walk in among the buttes which are interesting but, unfortunately, it was late in the afternoon and the sun wasn't in the best position for some good colorful pictures.
We drove to out to House Rock Valley Rd, took that north to US 89 and west to Kanab . The tour took about 10 hours from pickup to drop off and there's something to be said for letting somebody else do that kind of driving. I've done a few thousand miles on dirt roads and it isn't like driving the interstate. You can't put your mind in autopilot and just cruise along enjoying the scenery. You always have to be watching for rocks or stumps or mud or sand and it really can be work -
White Pocket Photo Gallery
Coyote Buttes South Photo Gallery
Other Resources
Updated 02/11/23 7:04 PM
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