American Road Trip Itineraries

[helenabonhamfarter]

Hi
I am starting to explore a road trip to West USA next year- for up to 3 weeks. July 2023.
I would like to include some of Grand Canyon, Bryce, Monument Valley, Lake Powell, Moab, Zion etc but also a few days of Theme Parks in LA.
The kids will be 13 and 14 years old.
Has anyone one done this sort of thing and share an itinerary/who you booked through.
Mulling over an RV option? Is it worth it or simply drive between hotels etc.
Could we fly to LA do theme parks (which ones are best for ?4 days) then drive to Las Vegas do loop with RV and then fly home from Vegas (which shows are currently the best ?Cirque du Soliel). I like the idea of sandwiching raw scenery/USA with theme parks and Vegas.
Can anyone help or share experiences please on any of this?

Hot. Far. Hours driving. Would you just stand around & look at things when you arrive at Zion, etc.?

You're talking some large distances OP. Google Maps can tell you how far it is between different places and how long it will take you to drive. I suggest you spend bit of time on there figuring out how long you'll be driving and whether those sort of distances in summer temps (around 100 degrees in the desert), are something you and your family will want to do day after day.

But, broadly, yes it's doable and many of those places are ones I've been to and are well worth visiting. However, if you want to hike in the NPs you'll need to get up early and get your hikes done before it gets too hot and carry lots of water.

Yes, you could fly to LA and out of Vegas with several airlines from the UK (BA, Virgin and their US counterparts). A friend of mine did two RV trips and said they were great, but RVs are huge, the roads in the NPs will be very busy in summer and you/your DP will need to be confidant that you can drive the thing. My friend and her DH have a camper van so they were confident driving a large vehicle, but an RV is fucking massive!

In terms of theme parks in LA, Disneyland is in Anaheim, an area south of LA in Orange County, as is Knott's Berry Farm (big roller coasters). Universal Studios is in Universal City, which is north of central LA and Warner Bros studios is in Burbank (also north of LA). Do your homework as to which will appeal to your family. We went to Warner Bros studios last summer and the focus is very much on old shows like Friends, Gilmore Girls, etc, which your kids may not be at all interested in (mine weren't, aged 14 and 11).

As for suggestions of who to book with - I don't know of any itinerary like yours exactly, but you could get Trailfinders to put one together for you if you're not confident doing it yourself. BA Holidays or Virgin Holidays have various itineraries you might want to look at for inspiration. People tend to do either California or Las Vegas and the NPs, rather than both in one trip.

Around the national parks also look at state parks. Far less famous but also less busy and just as beautiful, if not more so. Look at Goblin State Park as an example. Do you have to do LA theme parks? Why not do Las Vegas for a few rides and flashy stuff instead?

A loop from Vegas would work. We've planned it and will do it sometime.
Grand Canyon North Rim, Navajo bridge (condors), Horseshoe Bend, Lake Powell/Page, Monument Valley, Moab/Canyonlands/Arches then Capitol Reef, Bryce, Zion and back to Vegas could be done in a fortnight. However you've got to really love red rock and hiking, and not mind a bit of driving, which teens may not be up for.

You could do the above and miss out the Monument valley to Capitol Reef bit to save some time.

We did a road trip but it was in winter not summer. We had 4 days in New York then flew to San Francisco and had 4 days there.
Then we picked up the hire car and travelled north of San Fran passing through and stopping over in places like Napa, Sonoma, Point Reyes Station and ending up in Calistoga in the mountains.

We then came back down the coast highway and went south past Big Sur, Carmel, Monteray, San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara.

It was an epic journey and we loved it.

I'd like to drive east to west coast next time..

So much to see and do there!

Yeah I have done that trip. It was aces though we did it in spring rather than July which would have been too hot I think.

We flew into LA and did Disneyland and beach etc, then flew to Las Vegas, picked up the car and drove immediately out to Zion, Bryce, Capitol Reef, Moab, Monument Valley, Grand Canyon, Route 66 then back to Las Vegas.

Stayed in Las Vegas a couple of nights and then home.
We mulled over an RV but pleased we didnt in the end as it would have limited our day trips massively.

The flights, car, internal flight, LA and Las Vegas hotels were organised through a Trailfinders type agency. The rest we booked ourselves including the National park accommodation which needed booking a year out.

We did a similar trip, flew into SF - 3/4 days, got over the jet lag, hired a car - Yosemite. Spent 3 days there. DH was not keen to drive long distances so took an internal flight from Fresno to LV after depositing our car at Fresno airport. Did Grand Canyon, Zion, Bryce and Monument valley. Flew back from LV but could have come home from SLC.
Really enjoyed it.. we did it ourselves, lot of
Organisation but we enjoy the planning as well.

Highly recommend including Bodie on your trip- I found it fascinating!
www.bodie.com/

We did San Diego/Burbank (for Universal Studios)/Palm Springs/Santa Monica on our last US trip. It was great.

Before that, we’ve done LA/Palm Springs/ Las Vegas (on the drive from PS to LV we stopped off at Joshua Tree national park).

Another , more epic trip was San Francisco to LA via the highway coast road, taking in Monterey, Bug Sur, Seven Mile Drive, Hearst Castle and an overnight at the awesome Madonna Inn. We then drove down to Anaheim for Disney, Queen Mary etc. Flew to Phoenix, hired a car and stayed in Sedona before driving on to Las Vegas via the GC.

Love US road trips!

Second Bodie, absolutely amazing place,

Distances are huge. Driving different to the UK as highways are straight and seemingly endless; easy to go into autopilot.
I went in spring, so didn't have to factor in heat.
I loved travelling out of San Francisco, through northern California and into Oregon, but then I love deep forests, mountains and rugged coastlines.

How about a sport utility type vehicle rather than an RV? RVs are very hard to maneuver, use fuel at an astounding rate and the price of petrol is shocking.

I have done lots of long road trips in the US. I would book it yourself rather than pay someone to do it for you, it'll be loads cheaper. SUV is a better option than an RV as it's cheaper and gives you more flexibility. I'd recommend getting a 4 wheel drive as some of the roads in National Parks etc aren't great.

Don't miss Monument Valley, it's incredible. If you can, stay at The View. It's the only hotel in the park and every room has an incredible view.

Plan your trip using Roadtrippers.com It will help you plan a route, estimate fuel costs and suggest places of interest along the way.

Be prepared for it to be HOT!

We are currently in the US and having an amazing time having spent 5 days in Santa Monica, 2 days in Disney, 4 days in Yosemite and heading to San Fran for a week tomorrow. The distances are big / 6.5 hours from Disney to Yosemite. And the drive was boring, I’m not going to lie! I’m not saying that to put you off, just be realistic about how much time you want to spend on the road.

We’ve thanked our lucky stars several times that we are here at Easter and decided to take the kids out of school for 4 days on top of Easter hols (not ‘important’ school years. Summer schools holidays mean crowded National Parks which takes away lots of the magic. We’ve found it pretty quiet here at Easter as lots of people are away on spring break. Temperatures are also good (although we had an unexpected heat wave in LA and enjoyed hot temps of 35 degrees

We did a loop from Las Vegas. Grand Canyon, Monument Vslley, Mesa Verde, Bruce Canyon, Canyonlands & Arches, Zion back to Vegas. 2 weeks in an RV and loved it. RV worked for us as DC were young and we could pull over when they were hungry and the distances between towns, some of which were the size of small villages in the UK, were long. Kids still remember the "Next MacDonals 82 miles" sign.

A couple more tips I thought of: if you're doing more than 2 National Parks, buy an annual pass, it's $80 and pays for itself very quickly. Also if you're driving on interstates, download the iExit app. It tells you what food is a available at each exit and saves a lot of time when you need something to eat on a long drive.

Hiya. I came across this thread as I'm researching for this summer ie 2022 (not good at planning too far in advance!) and I was looking for people's experiences of the Utah National Parks. My kids will be 14 and 12 by the time we go, so similar to yours OP.

I have a bit of experience to share too - the last few summers before Covid we went to the West Coast for 2.5 - 3 weeks. LA based initially, then a car hire and a couple of other stays in California.

We found the kids loved Disney at least as much as I did as a kid, and it turns out my husband and I quite liked it too, strangely. The Star Wars rides/new land helped for him, plus the fact that we all seemed to have a good time with fairly minimal planning. Anyway, they are all keen to go back again this year as they have missed it ;) but I'd like to try something new so we are thinking this time about LA plus an internal flight to either Las Vegas or possibly Salt Lake City and a route to some of the national parks there. These have been my experiences, which I'm factoring into our plan for this year:

• It is hot at Disney, but it's bearable with hats, lots of water, and not trying to do too much in one go. We've found that we've managed two trips into the park a day (we have stayed at the Hyatt Regency Orange County, outside park but an easy shuttle bus in, would recommend) with a rest in-between (usually afternoon), for 3 days. Then we've been ready to move on.
• We've tried Universal too. It was fun (great for the year my daughter was majorly into Harry Potter) but we probably won't do it this year; Its a long way from Disney in LA traffic so that makes it a pain. When we went we actually did it as a day trip from outside LA.
• We like Palm Springs for a place to chill out after LA. It is seriously baking in July/August (maybe 38 - 42 degrees C) but it's low season then so plentiful AirBnBs with pools and A/C which have made it a fun place to go. It's about an hour's drive from Joshua Tree National Park so we've gone there for the early evening a few times - great to catch the sunset and its much cooler then (plus Joshua Tree is higher altitude). Joshua Tree is also on the way to Las Vegas by car, and there are cool places to stay there in the desert too if you plan to drive to Las Vegas from LA. You can also take a cable car from Palm Springs up to the mountain next door. It's 15 - 20 degrees colder up there, with conifers etc - a bit crazy and a great escape from the heat.
• Other places we've been too, and liked, are Ojai (orange groves, hills, lovely scenery a little north of LA) and Mammoth Lakes (6 hours north, high altitude, mountain scenery, beautiful but felt a really long drive at the time). Big Bear Mountain is much nearer LA and we were thinking of that in 2020 before Covid struck.
• Husband and I went to Las Vegas before kids.... wondering about taking them there but on balance probably won't try to squeeze it in. First time we went we spent 3 weeks away and it just seemed slightly too long to be on the move. 2.5 suits us better I think.
• Generally we've found we don't enjoy having to move from place to place too often. The drives are a bit of a drag and it takes us a bit of time to find our feet in a new place. Also I think we don't like mapping every day out too much which you have to do more if you are always on the move (unless I guess you are happy to take pot luck with accommodation which so far we haven't wanted to).
• So, bearing this all in mind, for this trip we are thinking 3 nights at/by Disney, 3-4 nights in Palm Springs (we have a credit to use up from a Covid cancellation, otherwise we might skip it this time), fly from PS to either Salt Lake or Las Vegas, 1-2 stops in Utah (e.g. maybe Bryce and Zion, which are quite close stay, several days in each), fly back to LA, possibly a final day or two at Disney/relaxing, fly home. That feels about the right amount of moving around for us, assuming we have 2.5 ish weeks away. Obviously some might want to squeeze in more but as others have said, it can be tiring always being on the move.
• I'm going to look carefully at the temperatures. From an initial glance it seems as if Bryce is at higher altitude than Zion - or at least it seems to be a good deal cooler in July/August. Will compare with the other Utah parks/sites. Because 35 degrees plus is really hot for daytime activities (at least for us); high twenties or early thirties would be a lot more comfortable. Yes, evenings and early mornings are good times to do stuff if it is really hot, but then we'd want to make sure we had somewhere to stay where we could relax/swim/ sit in the A/C during the middle park of the day. Need to get my head around that aspect before we book that leg.
• Also will try researching activity companies/centres in the various locations who might help us make the most of the national parks when we are there. We have had some great trips/activity days using local guides in the US - can be expensive but IMO worth doing one or two things like that which we all really remember.

Hope some of that might be of use to you in your planning. I know only some of those things are on your list but happy to answer any questions if you have any.