The orientation
Start with the introduction film: the variety inside one conservation area — red sandstone, Native American pictographs and petroglyphs, wild burros, desert tortoise and Gila monsters — and the reminder that the desert changes by the day and the season. A day-tripper's road film then makes the approach every visitor makes: the city falling away as the red cliffs rise, and the 13-mile scenic loop from the car and the overlooks. A vanlife couple's first visit adds the newcomer's read — a sunset from the rocks and a hike toward 'Little Zion' navigated from a GPS track.
The hikes, hiker to hiker
- Calico Tanks (from Sandstone Quarry, beneath the Calico Hills and the Keystone Thrust cliffs) — practical narration with the warning that matters: on an October Saturday the lot was three-quarters full by 8:05 a.m.; if you're not parked by nine, you're out of luck. The desert water pocket at the wash's end is the payoff
- Dale's Trail — the baseline connector from Pine Creek Canyon toward Ice Box Canyon, and a local secret: these trailheads don't sit on the scenic drive; you reach them by hiking up the canyon trails first. Route-linking advice for experienced desert hikers
- 3 Basin Circuit — a linked loop from Calico Basin through the scenic area to Brownstone Basin, filmed in the third week of January with snow dusting the Rainbow Mountains, every junction waypointed. A long, serious hike, not a casual stroll
Red Rock is the Strip's pressure valve — twenty minutes out, a different planet. Our day-trips coverage pairs it with Hoover Dam and the Valley of Fire when you're ready to range further.
Sources: the six videos on this page — an orientation film, a scenic-drive road film, a first-visit sunset film, and three local-hiker trail films — summarized from their entries in our catalog.