HIKING HAPPENINGS - February 2025

The Colorado River slices through the Moab Valley and is fed by two major creeks, Mill and Pack. Like its sister creek, Pack Creek starts in the La Sal Mountains, snaking its way west. The creek continues through town, crossing under Main Street just north of the turnoff to Kane Creek Boulevard on its way to a rendezvous with Mill Creek. The combined Pack and Mill Creek waters then pour into the Colorado.


When I moved into an apartment on West Center Street, Google Maps informed me that a park was just south of me and the Pack and Mill Creeks’ confluence. I also found some years-old online postings that featured a metal sign at the trailhead of these woodsy paths: Bullick Cross Creeks Park. What else could I find out about this tucked-in greenspace starting from town, so close to town, yet feeling far from town? Cross Creeks offers three sandy paths: a south fork that comes out at Kane Creek Boulevard, a middle fork that connects with a paved, western segment of 200 South, and a north fork that “ends” (where you may want to turn around) at a small, metal bridge that crosses northeast onto the Mill Creek floodplain.



On this sunny, winter morning, my own wandering starts at the end of West 200 South, past an auto parts store and hotel. I park in a designated on-street parking slot (avoiding business parking spots) and pick up a coffee at the hotel’s café. I then cross the bridge over Pack Creek, and, wow! I’m in the woods! I keep my dog on a leash, respect all private property, and honor No Trespassing signs and active work or construction zones. In the 1960s, the Bullick family owned land in this area and dammed Pack Creek to create a large pond. Sometime in the late 1980s, storm floods breached the dam, and the pond was flushed away. Around the early 1990s, the City started planning a parkway, which now stretches from Rotary Park to 100 West. David Olsen, former Moab Planning Coordinator and then Community Development Director, relates how, after some back and forth haggling, the City eventually agreed to purchase the Bullick’s land, envisioning trails and bridges. Buffered from Moab’s central commercial district businesses and an office campus that includes the Moab Free Health Clinic, this park offers natural beauty and seclusion. Whether you’re local, staying at a rental cottage, a friend’s house, or in one of the numerous hotels west of Main Street, this wonderland is easily accessible for a stroll through reeds, grasses, elms and cottonwoods. One monster cottonwood specimen on the park’s south fork appears to grasp at unwary walkers with its toppled, splintered branches. So very Brothers Grimm! Windstorms sometimes blow through Moab, so I carry a bag for collecting errant trash that can collect in the shrubs and trees, carefully stowing my empty paper coffee cup in my pack. And, if you’re lucky enough to be in Moab during or just after one of our snowstorms, this modest park could certainly become a sparkling wonderland. I invite you to enjoy, protect, and savor this special greenspace.