Joy Jordan Woodhill Loop Ride and Dam Legs and Rock Art

SURFACE is dirt two-track and gravel road primarily. LOOP (only) distance is 11 1/2 miles and 2 hours (no sightseeing included) or less. DIFFICULTY is easy to moderate. STAY OUT IF WET!

Being as I like to write about Utah trails in this Utah blog, I will say that this trail actually is in Fredonia, Arizona. But it is the closest place to ride mountain bicycles near Kanab, Utah. Fredonia was born of Kanab anyway.

2.7 miles south of the Utah/Arizona border turn left off Hwy. 89A onto Joy Jordan Woodhill Trail. This will shortly turn to gravel. It is 1 mile on the most main road to the electric substation. (There is a telephone pole trail there which is kinda' fun to ride.) 1 mile past the substation there is a dirt road left. PARK! If one passes a large tank right one is too far!
From the car park: 1 3/4 miles from parking, continuing on the most main gravel road, at the third picnic table, is the "Clam Shell". It is some cool rock art, don't deface. It is probably up a little higher on the cliff than expected. Look for the clam-shell-looking shelf of rock and a trail up to it. It is east of the picnic table. The route from the car park to the "Clam Shell" is slightly uphill and loose gravel. So it is a good place to get in some CV and get the pedals rotating. 
At 2 miles from the car bear right and stay below the cliffs. Again at 2 1/2 miles. Now you're getting it, stay below and follow the Chocolate Cliffs. At 3.6 miles there is a big Bureau of Land Management gate left, which you should leave as found. For our loop don't go through the gate but go straight. The route from the rock art to the gate is 2-track dirt with lots of moguls. No CV here but good aerobics. There are a couple of uphill pulls but this 60 year old guy handled them. Oh yeah, if you want to go through the gate (a couple miles out then back) staying along the cliffs, this could be a 4 mile LEG (more difficult).
Shortly after the gate it is zooming coasting time to the fourth  picnic table at mile 4.7.
At the picnic table I go straight on a sandy track. There is one bad loose downhill where I picked up some road rash, but shortly after this one is back on the main gravel road. Just zoom west toward the obvious town as it is almost all downhill. A word of warning: Don't get going too fast on the gravel. Last time I was out here someone lost it and flipped their car. STAY IN CONTROL OR SUFFER ROAD RASH OR WORSE.
At mile 7.1 pass the fifth picnic table today.
At mile 7.8 go left on quasi pavement.
At mile 8 get up on the dam and head north. If you don't want to be on the berm there are two-tracks left and right side. If on the dam, leave the gate just past the cemetery as found.
At mile 9.8 go right on the main road and head toward the substation and the car park. This last 1 1/2 miles is gravelly and tedious again so I finish my CV now.
Here is the other 3 1/2 mile LEG. From the car park, if you are still fresh (I was not on this hot July day), proceed north on the dirty two-track after resetting trip odometer. This road kind of follows telephone lines and heads toward cliffs and downhill to a gate. Leave this gate as found at .7 mi. from the car.
At 1 mile the route bends right or east below the cliffs.
At mile 1.4 bear left to a turnaround at the cliffs and the Shinarump Formation pictographs. Again, this rock art may be hard to see. Again, it is fragile.
It is above and east of the turnaround, 1.7 miles from the car park.
There are plenty of other paths to just roam in the area and I guess there are trails on top of the cliffs also. With proper hydration one could ride for days here, south of Kanab and east/north of Fredonia. And Fredonia has real beer!


Post script:
So it turns out that the next day we did get up on top of the Chocolate Cliffs. The top is accessible if one takes a left at the 2 or 2 1/2 mile mark (loop ride) from the car park. We didn't do any biking up there but got in some good cardiovascular speed walking (5 mph). It's like a nice cinder track surface on top. It does look like eastward there is miles of trail up there. We saw plenty of bicycle tracks.