Smithsonian Butte Road to Wire Mesa Trail

MikeJones

Smithsonian Butte Camping Overview

A little while ago I made my second trip to Smithsonian Butte Road out in Utah. I was going to Zion National Park for the weekend, and Smithsonian Butte is a great free place to camp outside of the busy, crowded National Park.

You can get some more information on the Utah Website for Smithsonian Butte Road along with directions. Or you can check out this Google Maps pin for directions to the start of the road.

Before this particular trip, I stopped by Smithsonian Butte road once before but I got there after dark and there was no moon, so I missed some of the beautiful rocks. Instead of the beautiful rocks, I did see some amazing stars instead!

Either way, I was glad to go back this time and get there during the day. It allowed me to explore a little and actually pick a nice campsite. For this trip, I drove all the way down and found a nice spot located here .

This was our amazing campsite:

And did I mention we had views in all 360 degrees!

If you plan on taking the trip to Smithsonian Butte, I recommend a four-wheel drive vehicle with decent clearance. The main road is steep and not too technical for off-roading standards, but I would not attempt this after a fresh rainstorm, especially because how steep the road is.

I took one picture on the way out of the road with my camera phone, most of the road looked similar to this picture the day we traveled it:

Smithsonian Butte Camping Map

If you would like to see a detailed map that I created, you can see my custom made Smithsonian Butte Road map on Caltopo.

MikeJones

Over Veterans Day weekend my wife and I headed back out to Utah to check out Coyote Gulch. We headed back to Smithsonian BUtte Road to spend the night on the way out to eastern Utah and we saw a lot of changes!

They now built a parking lot at the start of Wire Mesa Trail, and an informational sign and a trail registry to sign in. I also recorded the drive up Smithsonian Butte Road and the portion along Wire Mesa to the campsite in my post above. I stopped about 100 meters from the camp site because there was a family already there on this particular trip so we had to turn around:

After driving up Smithsonian Butte Road and turning off onto Wire mesa you will now see this trail register:

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Inside is a book you can sign and let the good folks who take care of the land know where you are visiting from and what kind of activities you plan on partaking in while there.

Next to the trail register is a brand new trailhead sign to give you some details about the area and some info on camping up there:

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Here is a zoomed in image of the camping details:

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dirtnsmores

loving your website. great work on all these trail reports!

MikeJones

dirtnsmores Thanks so much for the kind words! Feel free if you go anywhere to share your own trip reports as well! Also check out our App, Dont Forget the Spoon for gear planning for your next trip!