SUNday | April 12, 2026

Mill canyon Dinosaur Track site

Led by BLM Paleontologist Emily Lessner

Just off Highway 191 north of Moab, the Mill Canyon Dinosaur Track Site preserves footprints left by dinosaurs 112 million years ago, when this area was part of a muddy shoreline near a shallow lake. Dinosaurs walked across soft, wet ground, leaving impressions that were quickly covered by thin layers of sand and silt, preserving their tracks. Today, hundreds of footprints from several types of dinosaur (and even some birds and crocodilians) are visible within the small confines of the track site, offering a rare snapshot of daily life in the Early Cretaceous. Rather than bones, these tracks capture real moments in time: animals moving, pausing, and crossing paths on an ancient landscape, making the site an especially vivid and fragile window into Utah’s deep past.

This half-day trip is excellent for folks of all abilities and young families. The track site is a short, accessible walk from the parking area.

See below for important trip information.

  • Participants must drive their own vehicles.

    Any vehicle can make the trip.

    Round trip travel from Green River is 66 miles.

  • Bring lunch, water, sturdy shoes, binoculars, camera, and snacks. 


  • Emily Lessner
    Paleontologist

    Emily Lestner, PhD, is the BLM Paleontologist covering Vernal, Price, Moab, Monticello, Jurassic National Monument, and Bears Ears National Monument. She earned her PhD from the University of Missouri where she studied nerves in the faces of reptiles.

    She's been part of fieldwork in the Triassic-aged rocks of the Colorado Plateau for 10 years, working in New Mexico, Arizona, and Utah, in addition to conducting fieldwork in the Cretaceous and Paleocene of Colorado, North Dakota, and Montana.

How to Sign Up

A theropod track stands out after rainfall at the Mill Canyon site. Photo by Ryan Baxter.