When my husband and I got married in November 2020, we brainstormed ideas of where to honeymoon. Many countries were not allowing foreigners, so we wanted to find a beautiful place to visit in America. We were frequent visitors to Big Bend National Park and thought we could expand our national park checklist. It sounded like a great honeymoon idea to do a Utah national parks roadtrip!
This would be our first long multi week road trip and being the type A person I am, we needed to plan this out. This is how I planned a 2 week roadtrip to visit the 5 Utah national parks!
Getting to Utah
First, we needed to figure out how we would get to Utah from Austin, Texas. We could fly, but we would need to consider the cost of the flight and a rental car for 2 weeks.
We also considered driving from Austin to Utah. This would be a long drive, over 17 hours. We would want to stop overnight in New Mexico to rest, adding a day of travel.
We decided to drive instead of fly to save money and have more flexible packing options. We had a great reliable car that we could take. We did buy a VacLife Air Compressor Tire Inflator to prepare for any road conditions, including packing tools needed to change a tire and Car Jumper Cables. By taking our car, we could also pack as much as we wanted.
Most importantly, we packed food in our car and planned meals for 2 weeks. Our experience visiting national parks made us weary of great food options nearby so we wanted to bring enough food for us to make at our AirBNBs. We budgeted eating out if we came across a place we wanted to try. I will probably write a blog post in the future detailing the meals we planned and what food we brought for this 2 week roadtrip.
Planning our 2 week Utah national park roadtrip
After deciding to drive to Utah, we could start to map out where we would stay. We did not want to drive 17 hours straight from Austin to Utah, so we needed to find a place to stay overnight. Albuquerque or Santa Fe were about 10-11 hours from Austin and looked to be a good rest stop. We decided to stop in Santa Fe on our way to Utah, but would stop in Albuquerque on the way back home as a way to see two different cities.
We would drive from Santa Fe to Moab and stay there to visit Arches National Park and Canyonlands National Park. We would then drive to Torrey to visit Capitol Reef National Park. From Torrey we could stop at Bryce National Park for a day visit, then continue on our way to stay in Springdale to visit Zion National Park. When we were done at Zion, we would make the drive to Albuquerque to stay overnight, then drive back to Austin.
This ends up looking like:
Austin > Santa Fe > Moab > Torrey > Springdale > Albuquerque > Austin
Where to stay to visit each Utah national park?
Determining your budget will help decide where you should stay when visiting these national parks. We decided to stay at AirBNBs for each national park because we wanted to cook a lot of our meals. This was also our honeymoon trip so we splurged a little more on our AirBNBs for the occasion. We considered camping, but we are beginner campers and it sounded too stressful to coordinate camping logistics for 2 weeks. The weather was also colder in November in Utah than us Texans were used to!
Using AirBNB, I searched for availability near the parks. I’ll also Google a phrase like “Where to stay to visit Arches National Park and Canyonlands National Park?” to see what cities or ideas come up.
Moab was a great town for us to stay in to visit both Arches National Park and Canyonlands National Park. It had restaurant options, grocery stores, and small shops for us to visit.
To visit Capitol Reef National Park, we stayed in Teasdale because we found a spot that fit our budget. My original Google searches said to stay in Torrey, but we didn’t see many options and Teasdale was super close to Torrey. There were very limited food options or shopping here, but this is where packing our own food came in handy.
To visit Zion National Park, Google searches told me staying in Springdale, Utah. The prices of AirBNBs in Springdale were too high for our budget, with not many options to pick from. This led me to expanding my search to other outside cities. We actually ended up staying in La Verkin, a town outside of Springdale. I searched on Google Maps directions from La Verkin to Zion National Park Entrance to see how far away it was. It was 30 minutes from the entrance but we were okay with the drive and it worked for our budget.
How many days to visit each Utah national park?
I had an idea of the cities we would stay in and now needed to decide how many days to spend in each city and national park. This is usually tough for me, but I’m a visual person! The best way I do this is by drawing a calendar and filling in the departure and arrival dates we were aiming for.
To decide how many days to visit each national park, I researched each national park to see how many days people typically recommend in each park. I literally Google this phrase, “How many days to visit Arches National Park” for each park to get an idea. This will bring up search results from the National Park Service website, message forums like Reddit and TripAdvisor, and blogs like this one!
I’ll map out this info on the calendar to see if it’s enough time in each place, moving days around as I learn more info. I don’t like being too rushed or constrained on time during vacation and I like to build in a rest day when returning from vacay (or if anything goes wrong!). The trip ends up looking like this on the calendar:
Book accommodations
Okay up until this point, this has been a lot of research. I told you I’m type A, I love to get as much information as possible to make an informed decision!
After looking up what cities to stay in and understanding how many days to spend in each Utah national park, I’m ready to book accommodations! I booked my AirBNBs in Santa Fe, Moab, Teasdale, La Verkin, and Albuquerque.
Research trails for each national park
With accommodations booked, I could now get to the fun part: finding hiking trails!
The National Park Service (NPS) has very helpful information with maps of the parks and trails for each national park. Start here to see which trails are within your difficulty range. Save the names of the trails you’re interested.
I also use AllTrails to look up photos and reviews of trails from other hikers. Look up each national park to see the popular trails and elevation of hikes. I’ll often cross-reference trails from the NPS website and see what hikers have to say about them on AllTrails.
Buy an America the Beautiful National Park Pass
Each of the national parks we were visiting had a vehicle entrance fee, anywhere from $25-35. Save money by purchasing an America the Beautiful pass! For $80 (as of 2022), this pass is good for 1 year and grants you entrance to any of our national parks or federal recreation lands. It typically pays for itself if you’re visiting more than 3 national parks in a year.
Start your Utah national parks roadtrip
We had our route, where we were staying, and our hiking trails mapped out for each national park. We were ready to start our 2 week Utah national park roadtrip! In the upcoming weeks, I will share the itineraries we did for Arches, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef, Bryce, and Zion. Let me know if this information was helpful!
