Vacationing in Utah (Salt Lake City, Vernal, Kanab: rent, hotels, camping)
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Hello everyone. My wife and I are planning a vacation for next summer. What we want to do is fly into Denver, rent a car, and proceed to drive this route over the course of 2 weeks:
We are into adventure sports: hiking/backpacking, kayaking/canoeing, primitive camping, etc., so those are the kinds of activities we will be looking for. For lodging, the plan will be an improvised mix of camping and cheap hotels (no reservations except for those occasions when we will be at a place where it is necessary). I am posting a thread on each City-Data forum for the five states we are hitting in the hopes that locals or those who have previously vacationed in these areas might be able to point out places not to be missed, whether it be attractions, restaurants, camping areas, etc.
A little clarification on the route: we are wanting to stay off the interstates as much as possible. It has been my experience that a vacation doesn’t really start until you get off the beaten path. The specific stops on the map are not so much stops as they are locations to keep us on our desired route.
A few places we definitely want to hit:
-Grand Canyon
-A night around Area 51 (no, I don’t believe in aliens and all that but I’ve always wanted to camp a night out there)
-Rocky Mountain National Park (we visited there this summer so will be looking for more obscure things to do this time around)
Aside from that, nothing set in stone…just whatever is on our route and interesting.
As far as timeframe, we can go at pretty much anytime once my wife is done teaching for the year. Any recommendations as to when? We didn’t find Rocky Mountain to be very crowded in early June, which was a nice surprise. Is early June the best time for all of these locations, weather-wise and avoiding-the-crowds-wise (speaking in a relative sense, realizing that summer will have crowds no matter what)?
Any and all thoughts welcomed and appreciated. Thanks!
I'm glad you've included Salt Lake City in your itinerary. There's quite a bit to see and do in this area, things I'm sure many of us will be happy to fill you in on. Unfortunately, it looks like you are going to be missing all five of Utah's incredible national parks which, if not actually criminal, is tragic at the very least! I know what you mean about getting off the interstate, but I've got to tell you, from E to G is going to be a huge disappointment and you're going to leave Utah having missed some of its most beautiful scenery and instead driving through an ugly desert.
Thank you, Katzpur. Due to the great responses I am receiving to my post both here and on other state forums, I am beginning to tweak my route. Now I have completely abandoned D to G. In fact, I'm not even going west of I-15 and I'm not sure about going north of I-70 (this can change, of course...I have a year to figure this out). The only reason I wanted to go into Nevada was to camp for a night around Area 51 but I suppose I am willing to put that off for another time. There is, of course, the allure of Area 51, but what I really want is a night camping in the desert under the stars. You say "ugly desert"...is there pretty desert? Because I have never visited the desert before and, while I don't want to spend 2 weeks driving through ugly desert, I would like a day or two seeing the best the desert has to offer. Any suggestions are most welcome.
Here is one route that was suggested to me which allows for the Area 51 trip. Any thoughts on this?
Katzpur is not kidding either & if you happen to be an animal lover I recommend visiting the Best Friends Animal Sanctuary just 5mi north of Kanab, UT.
Thank you, Katzpur. Due to the great responses I am receiving to my post both here and on other state forums, I am beginning to tweak my route. Now I have completely abandoned D to G. In fact, I'm not even going west of I-15 and I'm not sure about going north of I-70 (this can change, of course...I have a year to figure this out). The only reason I wanted to go into Nevada was to camp for a night around Area 51 but I suppose I am willing to put that off for another time. There is, of course, the allure of Area 51, but what I really want is a night camping in the desert under the stars. You say "ugly desert"...is there pretty desert? Because I have never visited the desert before and, while I don't want to spend 2 weeks driving through ugly desert, I would like a day or two seeing the best the desert has to offer. Any suggestions are most welcome.
Here is one route that was suggested to me which allows for the Area 51 trip. Any thoughts on this?
If you were to keep your original intinerary you would see the difference when crossing from NV into UT. Actually the same applies when crossing from AZ into UT.
UT looks as if God dropped his crayons.
LOL WFW&P. Yeah, I'm hearing it is some pretty desolate country in my original itinerary. I'm hoping the new route or alterations thereof will be a little more what we're looking for.
Clearly it seems there is no need to stray outside of the boundary created by interstates 25, 40, 15 and 70. First question, now, is where to fly in and out? A one-way trip is a possibility if we can find a good enough deal on a rental, but the rates I have seen indicate that a different drop-off location is something like 3-5 times more expensive than returning the car to the same location (when we were in Denver earlier this month, we rented a car for under $20 a day). It seems to me that a 2 week loop is doable enough that flying in and out of the same city would be fine, but I am open to suggestions.
Next big task, then, is to begin nailing down specifics of the route. What I am most interested in is maintaining a good variety in the places we visit. Someone mentioned that we might see more canyons than we care for, and that is something I want to avoid if possible. Not canyons specifically, but in general. Yes I want canyons, but I also want mountains, desserts, rivers, lakes, old mining towns, ghost towns…anything out there that is different than the last. In a way, I sort of look at this as a scouting trip. I want to find an area that really speaks to us that we might want to return to in the future, spending extended time in just that location. That’s why I want to cover so much ground with this trip.
Anyway, with everyone’s suggestions, I will begin devising an itinerary. If any of you feel the inspiration to fire up Google Maps and put together a route, I’d love to see it. At this point I’m not really looking for suggestions that are far outside of the natural loop my map presents, but anything that has been overlooked that is on or near the route, please let me know!
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Just a suggestion.
If you *fly into Denver*, have you thought about taking the train to Salt Lake City ?
Quite a beautiful ride. Then rent a car and do the rest.
Thanks for the suggestion, irman. I bet the scenery on that train ride would be amazing. For this particular trip, though, I think ending up in SLC is a bit further north than we would want to go.
SouthernBelle, we will definitely have to take a look at Las Vegas flights compared to other airports we could come in at. Quite a few people have been telling me that Vegas is likely to be the cheapest and it wouldn't be far out of our way.
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