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Heavy rains in recent days washed a lot of silt and stones onto the steps, nearly obscuring some of them.  

The Chinle Formation is made of colorful bands of clay and can be found as far south as the Painted Desert.  Easy to spot amid all the other layers here with its rounded pale grey shape and bands of color.

 

Short stone-step switchbacks zig-zag up the slope.  

Every few turns it's cool to check out how much higher we are.  That feels like progress!

At last, we level out at the base of the next layer, Wingate Sandstone 

Interesting detail where the Wingate makes contact with the Chinle!

One more look back to see how far we've come.  

And now into Cohab Canyon.  There has been a lot of run-off after yesterday's rains.  We'll be hiking along a damp creek bottom most of the way.

One more look back and--

a look forward at the trail.  Sunlight is just peeking into the Canyon.  The  damp earth, wet vegetation and the release of the plants' oils mixed into the earth's minerals create the most wonderful fragrance known as "petrichor".

The trail winds between huge fallen rocks from time to time, rising and falling until we get down into the creek bed,

Ripples in the mud make beautiful patterns.  

Not many wildflowers to be seen other than an occasional  paintbrush.

And a sweet little green lizard warming his body on the rock

We met a  Flagstaff photographer along the route, Byron Neslen.  Watch for his cover photo in October's Arizona Highways!

Surprises everywhere.  While chatting with Byron, I looked up to see this window in the rock.

The sandstone submits to interesting erosional patterns--a rocky Swiss cheese.

The cliff walls lend themselves not only to cool holes, but straight-sided fissures and slots.  Of course, I had to venture in.

And a look back out.  Stan chats with another hiker.

The narrow Canyon walls begin to widen.  Our intent on this hike was to do one more ascent to two overlooks.  The side trail leading there is somewhere up ahead.

The Canyon opens to acres of slanted "slickrock".  Although easy to walk on, one can lose the trail easily. With no cairns to mark the way to the other side, we noodled around until in the distance--

Stan spotted two parallel lines of rounded lava rocks.  No doubt about the trail now!

The morning became increasingly hot and humid.  Clouds portending thunderstorms were beginning to form in the west.  Time for a little lunch, then retrace our steps.  We didn't make it to the overlooks, but that's OK.  This was an absolutely beautiful trail and it wouldn't be fun with the threat of lightning.

By the way, Stan's hat wasn't levitating from his head.  He had it balanced on his trekking poles.

Back through the Canyon and to the point where we'll start the 440' descent. to the car.  If you're ever fortunate enough to visit Capitol Reef, this is simply a delightful trail and worth the effort to get there.