The Crack is a half-day family hike into a little-known canyon which contains shallow narrows and interesting rock layers.  Difficulties encountered on the hike include route finding to access the canyon, avoiding taking the wrong turns at junctions within the canyon, and climbing some very small dry falls that should be easy for most people.  Topographical maps of the parking area and the route inside the canyon can be found by clicking on the buttons above.  GPS coordinates for the parking area are 36.573928, -116.922017.  GPS coordinates for the mouth of The Crack are 36.594957, -116.900450.

The Crack is an informal name that I have given to an interesting fairly long section of shallow narrows in the foothills of the Funeral Mountains.  Although heavy traffic drives by this area every day, most people likely assume that there are no interesting hikes that are located reasonably close to the road.  In fact, the general area where The Crack is located is probably only passed through by hikers a couple of miles to the southeast as they head for Indian Pass Canyon.  The Crack literally refers to a crack in the terrain of a large section of the Funeral Mountains foothills which divides that section into two.  This division creates a fascinating narrow canyon that has unique scenery which I have not seen anywhere else in the park.  The narrows that have been created are mostly layered with different types of rock.  The layers are uplifted or tilted at a sharp angle, rather than being flat and uniform as one might expect.  One of the most interesting layers of rock to check out is the pure sandstone that is on display at various spots throughout the canyon.  I first discovered The Crack while studying satellite imagery in late 2013.  During our February 2014 trip, it was the first family hike that we carried out.  Because the terrain getting there is easy to manage and there are no highly difficult obstacles within the canyon, I feel like a visit to The Crack is a good choice as a family hike.  The mouth of The Crack is located about 2 miles to the northeast from the parking area on Hwy 190.  The Crack itself is about 1 1/2 miles long from beginning to end.  It is narrow virtually the entire way, although true slot narrows only occur in sections of the hike.  Locating the entrance to The Crack can be a bit tricky without using a GPS unit or having good map reading skills and navigational abilities.  Our hike took place on February 21, 2014.

Many more photographs taken during our visit are available for viewing for this destination.  To see all of them, choose one of the two options presented below.  The two options are Slideshow viewing and Trip Report viewing.  The Slideshow option allows for viewing larger images with an autoplay option and a full screen option (available on most browsers).  This option works very well for large computer screens and tablets.  The Trip Report option allows for viewing smaller pictures in a standard scroll-down format and enlarging of any panoramic photos taken during our visit.  Click on the option of your choice to view all of our photos from this destination.  The Slideshow format opens in a new browser window and the Trip Report format uses the same browser window for viewing.