FEBRUARY 2018
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| MOON HOUSE RUINS |
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| GRANARY NEAR MOON HOUSE |
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| MOON HOUSE |
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| DWELLINGS NEAR MOON HOUSE |
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| INSIDE MOON HOUSE |
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| INSIDE MOON HOUSE |
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| RUIN JUST OUTSIDE MOON HOUSE |
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| NEAR MOON HOUSE |
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| DWELLINGS NEAR MOON HOUSE |
Moon House is a popular ruin site located off of highway 261 in Bears Ears. To get to the trailhead you will turn east onto Snow Flat Road from highway 261. You will then follow Snow Flat Road for about eight miles to the low-clearance vehicle parking. If you have a high-clearance vehicle you can continue an additional mile to the official trailhead. The eight mile drive to the low-clearance parking area is actually pretty rough. I made it in a Corolla, but I did scrape the bottom of the car a couple times. Luckily I didn't have anyone else in the car to weigh it down. Be really cautious if your vehicle is traveling low to the ground.
The hike is roughly five-and-a-half miles round-trip from the low-clearance parking area, and thee-and-a-half miles from the high-clearance parking area. The trail is mostly over slick rock, so watch for cairns. They can be a bit difficult to spot at times, so watch carefully. The cairns will lead you to the edge of a ravine, and guide you down a safe route to the bottom. From the bottom of the ravine it is just a short climb to the ruins above. Moon House is very impressive. You can actually enter into Moon House, where several interior rooms are accessed from a main hallway. There are also a variety of dwellings located just outside.
There is another set of really impressive, well-preserved ruins located about a half-mile to the right of Moon House. There is another small set about a half-mile to the left of Moon House that includes a kiva. However, these ruins are not very well preserved, and so were a bit of a let-down. I'd heard Moon House was becoming very popular, so I hiked it first thing in the morning during a trip in February. It paid off as I had the entire place to myself. In order to keep crowds down, the BLM actually requires a permit and limits access to 20 hikers a day from March 1st through June 15th and from September 1st through October 31st. So try to avoid those times.
