Visit Wilderness

Search for a wilderness as the destination for your next outdoor adventure.

Bob Marshall Wilderness Area, Minnesota

Why Visit Wilderness?

While wilderness can be appreciated from afar—through online content, television, or books—nothing compares to experiencing it firsthand. Activities like camping, hiking, or hunting allow you to fully enjoy the recreational, ecological, spiritual, and health benefits that wilderness areas offer. These areas provide “outstanding opportunities for solitude or a primitive and unconfined type of recreation,” chances to observe wildlife, moments to renew and refresh, and the physical benefits of outdoor exercise. In many wilderness areas, you can even bring your well-behaved dog.

Learn more about the diverse ways in which we benefit from wilderness and threats wilderness areas face today.

Beartrap Canyon Wilderness is small but shares a common boundary with designated wilderness in the Kolob Canyons portion of Zion National Park. Largely a rugged, steeply sloped area, this wilderness contains the headwater areas for many tributaries that flow through Bear Trap Canyon, on Kolob Terrace. A very short segment of stream in Bear Trap Canyon is designated as “wild” in the National Wild and Scenic River System. Beartrap Canyon Wilderness is an isolated parcel of land managed by the BLM. While its western boundary is contiguous with Zion National Park, its northern, southern, and eastern boundaries border private land. The terrain within its boundaries consists of a sandstone finger of a mesa and the upper reach of the Beartrap Canyon. Ranging from nearly 6,800 to 7,500 feet in elevation, both the mesa top and canyon bottom sustain Utah juniper, ponderosa, and pinyon pine trees. Despite its small size, but because of its proximity to adjacent wilderness and other relatively undisturbed lands, a wide variety of wildlife lives here. Hawks, falcons, and eagles soar above the canyons, while ringtailed cats, mountain lion, and black bear hunt in the uplands and along the canyon bottoms. The dissected remote canyons also offer suitable nesting habitat for the Mexican spotted owl, a threatened species. Summer temperatures often exceed 100°F with temperatures in excess of 90°F at higher elevations and day and night temperatures differing by over 30°F. Winters are cold and often wet with temperatures ranging from highs of 50°F to 60°F during the day to well below freezing at night. Beartrap Canyon Wilderness receives between 20 and 24 inches of rainfall each year. There are no maintained trails in the Wilderness.

Leave No Trace

How to follow the seven standard Leave No Trace principles differs in different parts of the country (desert vs. Rocky Mountains). Click on any of the principles listed below to learn more about how they apply in the Beartrap Canyon Wilderness.

Plan Ahead and Prepare
Travel and Camp on Durable Surfaces
Dispose of Waste Properly
Leave What You Find
Minimize Campfire Impacts
Respect Wildlife
Be Considerate of Other Visitors

For more information on Leave No Trace, Visit the Leave No Trace, Inc. website.

Location

Maps

Digital and paper maps are critical tools for wilderness visitors. Online maps can help you plan and prepare for your visit ahead of time. You can also carry digital maps with you on your GPS unit or other handheld GPS device. Having a paper map with you in the backcountry, as well as solid orienteering skills, however, ensures that you can still route-find in the event that your electronic device fails.

Online Maps

Interactive Map of the Beartrap Canyon Wilderness
Google Earth

Utah Wildernesses

Printed Maps

Fetching MyTopo from Database

USGS Store

Rules & Regulations

Motorized equipment and equipment used for mechanical transport is generally prohibited in all wilderness areas. This includes the use of motor vehicles, motorboats, motorized equipment, bicycles, hang gliders, wagons, carts, portage wheels, and the landing of aircraft including helicopters.

Wilderness-Specific Regulations

Learn more about why regulations may be necessary in wilderness.

Contacts

Applicable Wilderness Law(s)

Public Law 111-11

Date: March 30, 2009
Acreage: 40 acres

Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 - Public law 111-11 (3/30/2009) An act to designate certain land as components of the National Wilderness Preservation System, to authorize certain programs and activities in the Department of the Interior and the Department of Agriculture, and for other purposes.

For more information (To download or see all affected Wilderness areas) visit our law library for 111-11 or special provisions for 111-11 or legislative history for 111-11.

Want to Volunteer for Wilderness?

People who volunteer their time to steward our wilderness areas are an essential part of wilderness management. Contact the following groups to inquire about volunteer opportunities. Groups are listed alphabetically by the state(s) in which the wilderness is located.