Logan Canyon Scenic Byway

Cache Valley takes its name from the fur-trapping era of the 1820s, when mountain men working the Bear River country cached, or hid, their beaver pelts here between rendezvous. The valley floor was later settled by pioneer farmers who built the dairy towns and irrigated fields that still define it, with Logan growing into the region's college and market center.

Long before the trappers and farmers, Cache Valley and the Bear River Range were homeland to the Northwestern Shoshone, who wintered and gathered in this well-watered country. That history includes the tragedy of the Bear River Massacre of 1863, one of the deadliest attacks on a Native community in the American West, remembered today at a site north of the valley. The Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation remains present in the region.

The byway shadows the Logan River for most of its climb, and the river is the canyon's living thread. It is celebrated trout water, a blue-ribbon fishery whose riffles and pools draw fly anglers from across the region, with countless pull-offs where a visitor can watch the water or wet a line. The road crosses and recrosses the river as it gains elevation.

As it climbs, the canyon opens onto side drainages, campgrounds, and trailheads. Short walks lead to the Wind Cave, a limestone arch and hollow high on the canyon wall, and to the Jardine Juniper, a gnarled Rocky Mountain juniper thought to be well over a thousand years old, one of the oldest known trees of its kind. Near the summit the forest gives way to open ridges and the first view of the lake.

The byway's reward is Bear Lake, straddling the Utah and Idaho line at the top of the pass. Its water glows an intense turquoise blue, colored by fine limestone particles suspended in the lake, an effect that has earned it the nickname the Caribbean of the Rockies. From the summit overlook the whole lake spreads out, ringed by farm country and low mountains.

The lake is a summer destination in its own right, known for beaches, boating, and the raspberries grown in the valley around Garden City on its Utah shore. It is also home to several fish found almost nowhere else, including the Bonneville cisco, a small native fish that runs in winter and has been harvested here for generations.

The canyon is cut through thick beds of limestone and dolomite, ancient seafloor rock later uplifted into the Bear River Range and then sculpted by the river and by ice-age weathering. Caves, arches, and cliff faces along the drive all trace back to water working slowly on that soluble stone. Moose are common in the willows and aspen, and deer, elk, and the occasional black bear range the forest.

Each season reshapes the canyon. Summer is green and cool, ideal for river days and high hikes. Autumn is the showstopper, when maples turn scarlet and aspen gold for a brief, glorious run in late September and October. Winter blankets the summit in snow and turns the byway into a route for skiers and snowmobilers, while spring runs the river high and loud with snowmelt.

The closest Boutel™ stays, so you can turn this stop into an overnight. Each is an independently owned, editorially selected place to stay.