In the spring of 2021, we made our way out to Nevada, Utah, and Arizona for a six day road trip that covered several National Parks. We flew into Las Vegas to begin our journey then made our way to Phoenix, Arizona for our departure flight home. We visited 8 different major landmarks/parks along our route and ended with a short but special visit with some friends in Phoenix before flying home. In this blog post, I will outline our trip in chronological order. If you are interested in this trip, you can download the itinerary here.
Day 1 – Travel Day to Las, Vegas
Our flight out of BWI on Southwest Airlines departed at 1:30 PM and arrived in Las Vegas at 3:40 PM. We had PLANNED to pick up the rental car, hit a local store to pick up food for the road trip, check in the hotel, then walk to Yolo’s Mexican Grill on the strip for dinner. As we were flying in to Las Vegas, we learned that they were in the midst of a dust storm! It was crazy to see this from the above in the airplane. When we landed and went to pick up the rental car, we realized that we would have to change our plans. The dust was so thick and it was so windy. Neither of us had ever experienced something like that before. We checked into the Residence Inn Las Vegas Hughes Center just off the strip and opted for dinner at Gordon Biersch since it was right across the street from our hotel. We made the decision to stay on East Coast time, since we would be doing a lot of early morning hikes, so we wrapped up our day around 7:30 PM. We were not overly impressed with what we saw of Vegas, so we weren’t too disappointed that we didn’t get to do our little walking tour; however, it was an easy airport to fly into and a perfect location to start the road trip!
Day 2 – Valley of Fire and Bryce Canyon
When I plan these road trips, I am careful about mapping out our driving distances. I typically start off with a longer drive at the beginning of the trip and then have a few days of minimal driving followed by one more longer day. I keep our drives minimal towards the end when I know we will be tired. For this trip, the first full day would be our longest drive. We left Las Vegas at 5 AM with the intention of reaching Valley of Fire Nevada State Park before sunrise so we could hike the Fire Wave Trail as the sun was coming up.
The drive to Valley of Fire from Las Vegas was an easy 45 minutes and well worth the visit, even if you are just staying in Las Vegas. Since this was a “drive by” stop and not a full day visit, we planned ahead which trail we would take and the stops we would make in the park. We gave ourselves an hour and a half to hike and drive through Valley of Fire before heading over the Bryce Canyon in Utah. The Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada is well worth a full day’s visit, but since we were limited on time, we opted to do the Fire Wave Trail at sunrise and it was the perfect little hike to start our road trip! We also enjoyed our drive through the park and will make this a longer stop the next time we visit.
The drive from Valley of Fire to Bryce Canyon National Park was 3.5 hours. We arrived at Bryce Canyon just before noon and by this time, it was packed. Parking was a bit of a pain and we lost about 30 minutes trying to find a parking space. It was a cold day and several snow squalls passed over the area, so we were able to enjoy Bryce Canyon with a bit of snow! Down in the canyon, the temps were a bit warm so there was little snow on the trail which was nice. The sun was warm and the air was cool and that made for perfect hiking! We had to layer up as we reached the top of the canyon. We spent about 3 hours in Bryce Canyon and enjoyed the Wall Street-Queens Garden Loop Hike. After reading reviews on AllTrails, we decided to do this trail counter clockwise and we are glad we did! The steeper section would have been at the END of the hike if we had gone clockwise!
Around 3:00 PM, we made our way down to Zion National Park, a 2 hour drive from Bryce Canyon. We had planned to do a sunset hike on the Canyon Overlook Trail, but it was closed due to fallen rock (this is a common occurrence in Zion National Park. We were a bit tired from the drive and hiking from the day, so we checked into Springhill Suites Springdale Zion National Park (highly recommend), grabbed dinner across the street and called it a day!
Day 3 – Zion National Park
Since we were only in Zion National Park one day, we decided to pick ONE trail that we really wanted to do, Angel’s Landing Trail. Unfortunately to hike the actual “Angels Landing” section of the trail, you need a permit and these are generated using a lottery system and we did not get selected; however, a park ranger (and reviews on AllTrails) encouraged us to take the Angel’s Landing – West Rim trail out to, what the park rangers refer to as, the “Patio”. This location on the West Rim Trail is higher in elevation than Angels Landing. We enjoyed this hike and would highly recommend it as an alternative to the Angel’s Landing overlook. We started our hike before the sun came up so that we could avoid the crowds. We had the trail to ourselves all the way up to Scout’s Lookout. The only person who passed us was the park ranger on his way to Angel’s Landing. As we made our way back down to the trailhead, we passed A LOT of people! If you do this hike, definitely get there early!
After our hike, we went back to the hotel to shower before making our way over to Page, Arizona. This was about a 2-hour drive and we stopped in Kanab for lunch at Havana Cabana Cuban – highly recommend! There are several stops you can make along this route, but we didn’t want to get into Arizona too late in the day. When we arrived in Page, it was mid-afternoon. We had planned to hop on over to Horseshoe Bend for sunset but we were pretty tired and it was extremely windy, so we went earlier so we could grab dinner and get to bed! Horseshoe Bend was a bit of a disappointment. It was VERY crowded – a lot of families and kids running around. We saw it and left. It definitely wasn’t a highlight for us on this trip!
Day 4 – Antelope Canyon and Walnut Canyon
This was high on my list of things to do on this road trip. I booked tickets for Antelope Canyon MONTHS in advance. At the recommendation of a friend, I decided to book both the Upper and Lower Canyon tours. The upper canyon is the more “popular” tour but we loved the lower canyon a bit more (although both were spectacular). Antelope Canyon is on land owned by the Navajo, so all tours go through Navajo Nation and the tour guides are Navajo. I loved this because along with a tour of this amazing geological natural wonder, we also received some amazing Navajo history along the tour! Everything about this part of the trip was amazing. For the tours, we used Dixie’s Lower Canyon Tour (lower canyon) and Chief Tsosie’s Antelope Slot Canyon Tours (upper canyon). Prior to our tours, we had time to check out Glen Canyon Dam at sunrise and that was a nice little walk to start our day!
Antelope Canyon is a slot canyon which is formed by flood waters eroding the desert sand over time. We did the lower canyon tour first. The lower canyon is narrow at the bottom and wide at the top making the canyon a bit darker the path very narrow with lots of twists and turns. This tour was about 2 hours and I enjoyed every minute of it!
After we finished the lower canyon, we heading to town to pick up the shuttle for the upper canyon. Unlike the lower canyon where you can drive right up to the trailhead, the upper canyon is a bit of a drive on a bumpy unpaved road. This canyon is wide at the bottom but narrow at the top, feeling more like a cave but still showcased some amazing formations with incredible orange glowing light!
After our tours, we had lunch at Big John’s Texas BBQ then headed south for the 3-hour drive to Sedona. Along the way, we made a spontaneous stop at Walnut Canyon National Monument just outside of Flagstaff. We had just enough time to do a short hike in this canyon before it closed. While the hike was short, it involved climbing down (and then back up) 185 feet of steps to an island-like formation in the center of the canyon which was once inhabited by Native people archeologists call Sinagua. This was a great unplanned visit that really helped to break up the drive to Sedona!
Days 5 – Sedona, Arizona
To wrap up our week, we ended in Sedona Arizona before flying out of Phoenix. Our visit here was short but sweet! We hiked two short trails in the morning, both were great! First we did the Fay Canyon Arch Trail which was short, but contained a fun rock scrambled up the side of the canyon to a naturally formed arch and a cool view of the canyon.
After that short hike, we headed to the Raven Caves Trail which was right off of a major road and an unexpected hidden gem! The caves were pretty awesome and since the trail was short, we extended it by scrambling down to Oak Creek before making our way back back to the car.
To wrap our time in Sedona, we rested a bit, showered, then headed to dinner at Elote Cafe. This restaurant only takes reservations for dinner and we made them months prior as soon as they opened up the dates. The food was AMAZING! After dinner, we headed to Phoenix to stay the night before flying home early the next day. Even though it was late, we stopped off to visit our friends who live not far from the airport. We enjoyed drinks and great conversation by the fire outside of their great little home then we checked into the hotel and crashed! It was an amazing FOUR days of hiking and driving!
Day 6 – Travel Day Home from Phoenix
Our flight home was at 8:00 AM and we were beat from our trip which meant we slept a good bit on the flight home. Traveling east is more difficult because you have the flight time but you also lose time going across the time zones. By the time we landed at BWI, grabbed our bags, got to our car, and drove home, it was after 6:00 PM. While our road trip was short and our days were packed full – we loved every minute of our vacation. If you like to keep moving and like to hike, feel free to download our itinerary which has more details about lodging, hiking, and mileage!
