Pipeline (Flat Iron Safari Route)

Dogs Unknown

E-Bikes Allowed

Features Commonly Bikepacked · Views

This ride is sandy, so pick your times carefully.

The north end of the trail is a staging area for cattle allotments on the plateau, and the cowboys use the pipeline to move the livestock in and out in the fall and winter. You won't enjoy riding through after they've passed and churned the sand.

In fact, it may be tricky to get through the big wash (Muleshoe Canyon) south of Kane Creek if the cows are in: the cowboys pen them here on the way in and out for the season: you either have to ride through the corral to pass through the area, or drop into the wash and thrutch your way through the underbrush and around the corral to rejoin the pipeline.

The fact that this trail keeps bikepackers off the busy, narrow, shoulder-less, guard-railed, semi-truck-infested section of Highway-191 earns it a star, and the remarkable views of the Lasal and Abajo Mountains, the cliffs of Bridger Jack Mesa, Black Ridge, and the Behind The Rocks Fins gets it another.

Most of the trail is sandy doubletrack or low-angle bedrock, and not technically difficult nor especially entertaining. But at several points, the route runs on the actual buried pipeline rubble. The three main sections that were blasted through the cliff bands above the washes to get the pipe down and across are often steep and deep--they may require walking down to cross the ravines, and they will definitely require dragging your bike back up. This trail is marked on some maps as the Flat Iron Safari Route, but it takes pretty special conditions to allow even a capable 4WD vehicle to swim up the worst of these loose sections of line in Muleshoe Canyon.

It's hard to get lost. Just start at the Looking Glass Rock gravel road (131) off Hwy-191, or at the Flat Iron Mesa subdivision gravel road (164) just south of the Williams LNG pumping station for a shorter ride. Pedal north along the pipeline until you reach the Kane Creek Canyon Trail across from the Hole 'N' The Rock tourist trap.

You can park off the highway at both ends and in the middle. Riding north from the middle is much, much easier, more fun, and more scenic than riding south from Kane Creek. The southern half of the trail between Flat Iron Mesa Road and Looking Glass Rock Road is the opposite (better north to south), but the difference isn't as stark. Of course, you'll get to see both if you ride the trail as an out-and-back.