The Fossil Discovery Trail at Dinosaur National Monument is an easy and fun hike. It is one of the monument’s most popular hikes because it runs between the visitor center and the Quarry Exhibit Hall, which are both popular places.
How to Get to the Fossil Discovery Trail
You can start the Fossil Discovery Trail from either the Dinosaur National Monument visitor center or from the Quarry Exhibit Hall. Most people start from the Quarry Exhibit Hall. If you are there when the shuttle is running the best thing to do is leave your car at the visitor center, take the shuttle up to the hall and see the fossils, and then hike the Fossil Discovery Trail back down to the visitor center and pick your car up there. Because we were there in the early spring the shuttle was not running so we had to hike both directions.
To get to the trail head by the exhibit hall you need to walk a short ways down the road that goes up to the Quarry Exhibit Hall. You need to walk next to the guardrail so that cars coming both directions will be able to see you. Make sure you hang on to small children as there is not much room between you and the cars. The trail head is at the end of the guardrail and is marked by a trailhead sign.
What You Will See Hiking the Fossil Discovery Trail
The point of the trail is really to try and see fossils. This is supposed to be accomplished by hiking down three spur trails. The spurs are each pretty short and each are supposed to have a different kind of fossil along them.
The middle spur is part of the same set of fossils that is found in the Quarry Exhibit Hall. It has the largest fossils because they come from dinosaurs. After the exhibit hall however these fossils seem much more difficult to find. Part of the difficulty comes from the trail running directly underneath the fossil deposit, so you really have to crane your neck to look at it.
There are supposed to be arrows painted on the cliff face showing you where some of the large bones are, but we only ever found one of these arrows and it was in pretty bad shape. Hopefully they repaint them before the summer crowds show up.
The other two spurs have smaller marine life fossils that can be found in the rocks along the trail. We only did the first two spurs and then came back up to the Quarry Exhibit Hall because that is where our car was parked.
Be aware that the fossil discovery trail is completely exposed to the sun, so you will want to wear sunscreen and bring water with you.
Sum Up
The Fossil Discovery Trail can be a nice little hike if you are already visiting the Quarry Exhibit Hall. This would especially be true if you took the shuttle up from the visitor center. I don’t consider it a must do though since the fossils are pretty hard to spot.
If you hike the whole trail it is about 1.2 miles from exhibit hall to visitor center. Plan it taking you about an hour if you are doing it with children. Length will vary depending on how long you spend trying to see the fossils. Bathrooms can be found in the parking lot of the Exhibit Hall or at the visitor center.
