Another cool detour (from what is now fast becoming our favourite highway) from highway 89 north of Kanab is the Coral Pink Sand Dunes State Park. You can also drive in from the south and highway 389. We came in from the north, and the drive itself is quite cool with very desolate and deserted landscape on the way to the park.

The park has many cool attractions, the northern end is used by ATWs and 4X4s to spin around in the dunes, the main part of the dunes are protected and not allowed to drive in. You pay a fee of 10 USD to enter the parking and camping area. There is a RV park that looked nice, and the whole area was very quiet and serene. Check out Utah.com site for more relevant info about the park.

We did not have too much time, so we spent it looking around the dunes from the parking area. We could see people in the distance sliding down the dunes on body boards, looked cool indeed. The dunes are not really pink, more like a light to dark terracotta but they are still spectacular.

On the way back we stopped by the road north of the official parking and we met a group of scientists from Utah State University. They were counting beetles! We talked to them and what they told us was fascinating. The beetle they were hunting for was the Coral Pink Sand Dunes Tiger Beetle! Found nowhere else on the planet! How cool is that?? Only two populations still inhabit the area and the scientists from the university told us that the beetle still was not on an endangered species list and the population fluctuated with the drought and rains that came every season. Very fascinating!

Are the dunes worth a stop? Most definitely! If we had an RV or a camper, we would stop here for much longer. The tranquillity and remoteness was awesome and we were told the stars were particularly bright due to lack of any artificial light sources for miles around. A great detour!