Arizona – Utah trip

The Friday before Memorial Day, we flew from Atlanta to Phoenix (landed around 8 pm). We picked up our rental car at the airport and headed north to Sedona. We had submitted a Walmart pickup order at Anthem Way, so we stopped to get it (breakfast & lunch items, snacks, bottled water). A few small delays added up, and by the time we got to the hotel, it was midnight, which was 2 am central time, so we were tired! We stayed Friday & Saturday night at Club Wyndham Sedona.

SATURDAY ~

Since we got in so late Friday night, we slept in this morning. We ate breakfast in the room & then set out for our first hike of the trip, the Sugarloaf Loop Trail. You start this hike at Teacup Trail. The parking lot is small, but someone is always leaving. We didn’t have to wait long for a parking spot to open up. We would consider it an easy, maybe moderate hike, only because of the uphill parts of it, but we loved it. It was a gorgeous day ~ around 78°. We got some beautiful views of Sedona’s red rocks:

After our hike, we had lunch at the Outlaw Grille in Uptown Sedona. It was great! I loved the sweet potato fries 😋 After lunch, we went to the Rainbow Trout Farm to let Griffin fish. Fishing is only $1.50/person, and then you pay for the fish you catch (they will clean them for you). He caught two, and we took them with us and grilled them for supper. That worked out perfectly because we had already planned to swim at the hotel and grill hot dogs that night.

After fishing, we had a trolley tour at 3:30. Our guide told us some interesting things about Sedona and took us into Fay Canyon:

There are some really adventurous hikes in Sedona (check out Devil’s Bridge). If we had not gone to the trout farm, we were going to try to do the trail to the Birthing Cave. That’s one I would probably recommend if you have extra time in Sedona. We love hikes, but not ones that are scary or have big drop-offs. We just enjoyed touring Sedona and seeing the things we could see easily. It is a beautiful city 😊

SUNDAY ~

We slept a little late and then headed north to see Grand Canyon National Park! This was about a 2-hour drive. After we had been driving for about 45 minutes, we stopped at a viewpoint to stretch our legs.

After about 45 more minutes, we stopped at Burger King for lunch. It was the only food place around😳 When we left Sedona, we put “Grand Canyon Visitors Center” in our gps. We would of course be seeing it from the South Rim. Our first view of the Grand Canyon was at Mather Point. We could begin to see how grand it really is! Our photos do not do it justice. We said it almost doesn’t look real; it looks like a painting.

After getting some pictures here, we got on the blue shuttle bus and went to the Hermits Rest Route Transfer stop. We did part of the Bright Angel Trail.

It’s really cool because it goes down into the canyon. Griffin wanted to do this whole trail but it was several miles long & would have taken a few hours.

When we came back to the Bright Angel Trailhead, we got on the Rim Trail which is paved, and walked all the way back to the area that has Mather Point & the Visitors Center (about 2.5 miles). If I had realized that Mather Point was accessible from the Rim Trail, we would have probably just hopped on the shuttle as soon as we got to the visitors center, and Mather Point would have been our last stop, instead of taking the time to go there first. You could also start at Mather Point and walk along the Rim Trail as far as you want and take the shuttle bus back.

Bright Angel Lodge is near the Bright Angel Trailhead. We didn’t go inside it, but this would probably be a cool place to stay if you want to stay inside the park. I didn’t even think about there being lodging inside Grand Canyon NP. I had not checked on it because we weren’t spending a night close to there.

Leaving the Park, we saw several elk grazing by the road.

We headed north to Page, AZ for the night. It was another scenic drive:

On the way to Page, we stopped at Horseshoe Bend. We got there about an hour before sunset.

We had supper at Gone West Family Restaurant in Page. We enjoyed it, but it was late and we were ready for some rest. We stayed at the Holiday Inn Express.

MONDAY ~

This morning, we toured a slot canyon, Upper Antelope Canyon, and it was one of our favorite stops of the trip! Our tour was with Antelope Canyon Navajo Tours at 7:30 am.

We got some of the coolest pictures on this tour! 

After our tour, we went back to the hotel & packed up our suitcases and then stopped by a gas station. (There is a Walmart here so we could have waited & gotten some of our lunch items here instead of getting everything at the beginning of the trip.) We then went to the Wahweap Overlook to see Lake Powell. If you have a full day in Page, you can rent a boat or kayak to tour the lake; we just stopped to see it. This was honestly not the best view of the lake, but I didn’t know of a better spot.

After this quick stop, we headed north to Moab, Utah. On the way there, we drove through Monument Valley. You can see where Forest Gump stopped running. It was (like everything else😊) beautiful and so unique!

Our next stop was at the Newspaper Rock State Historical Monument. I didn’t realize until the next day that this monument is part of Canyonlands National Park. If you are taking this path, you could probably go ahead and see Canyonlands this afternoon/night. We went the next morning, but I think there would be enough time to see other things in this park on the way to Moab.

We ate supper at Milt’s Stop and Eat. You order at the window & either take your food to go or eat on the picnic tables outside, and they do have a few stools inside. We stayed at Holiday Inn Express in Moab Monday and Tuesday night.

TUESDAY ~

This morning, we headed to Canyonlands National Park. It is divided into 4 sections and is pretty spread out. We decided to go to the Island in the Sky District. If you type Island in the Sky Visitor Center in your gps, it will take you to this entrance. When you get there, the Grand View Overlook is still 12 miles away. On the way to it, we stopped at the Green River Overlook.

Then we drove to the Grand View Overlook and hiked part of the trail. We saw a small snake and several lizards on the hike.

We didn’t stay at Canyonlands too long because we had a tour scheduled & some other places to go see. The next thing we did was Mill Creek. We walked through the water (it was freezing!) to get to the rest of the trail and went a little ways until we got in the creek again. It was really pretty. We didn’t go all the way to the waterfall because it was farther than we thought and we didn’t have more sunscreen and water with us. (It was hot outside even though the water was freezing🤪)

Our hummer tour was at 1:00 with Moab Adventure Center and let me tell you – it was an adventure! Everyone enjoyed it, but I was scared the first half of the trip! It is a wild, off-road ride over rocks (many of them steep😩) and it made me so nervous 😂 We made one stop & got out of the hummer. It was 400 ft above the Colorado River, and we got some awesome photos. I was much better on the second half of the trip because I knew what to expect but whew! I was kinda ready for this adventure to be over😅 We definitely saw parts of Moab we would not have seen otherwise!

After the hummer tour, we went thru the McDonald’s drive-thru to get the kids something to eat before we headed to Arches National Park. Arches was a little different than what I expected; it seemed very remote, and everything is spread out. It’s just “nature”, as there are no buildings or places to get food once you get in the park (the visitors center is right at the entrance). It’s very easy to find your way around in Arches because there’s just one main road with a couple of side roads. They give you a map at the entrance (as they do at every park).

We made these stops:

*Balanced Rock – 0.3 mi roundtrip

*Sand Dune Arch – 0.3 mi roundtrip – this is a must-do! Kids love this stop! There’s a lot of sand, and most kids take their shoes off to play in it. The arch was pretty, but the whole area was just really neat because it was shaded & felt about 15° cooler than it did outside that day because there are tall rocks that shade you from the sun. We were there around 4 pm.

Broken Arch is also at this stop, but we didn’t walk to it because of the hot sun.

*Tunnel Arch:

*Pine Tree Arch – It’s pretty & it’s tall! If you go to Pine Tree Arch first, you can save yourself a few steps because you can see Tunnel Arch on your way back, without actually going in front of Tunnel Arch.

*Landscape Arch – when you get to it, keep going all the way around as far as you can to get the best pictures. It is so unique and really pretty!

The trail for Tunnel, Pine Tree and Landscape Arches starts at the same place. At the fork, go right (down the hill) for Tunnel & Pine Tree and then come back up the hill and go the other way for Landscape. Altogether, it’s a little less than 2 miles for all three. There are some inclines but we thought it was worth it to see all three of these.

*Delicate Arch Lower Viewpoint – from here, you can see the arch that’s on Utah’s car tags. It is cool because it’s just sitting up there on top of the hill. The hike to it is close by, but it’s a difficult 3-mile hike and we had not planned to do it.

*The Windows Section (it contains the next 4 arches on my list) – we parked our car in the upper parking lot and ate sandwiches/snacks in the car and rested a little bit before these last, easy hikes of the night.

*Double Arch – this was my favorite arch and probably Griffin’s favorite too. It is huge! You have to do the hike out to it to grasp how big the arch is (or arches, I guess). Griffin climbed pretty much all the way up to the top where the opening is😊

*Turret Arch – we hiked to it before we hiked to the North & South Windows. From the parking lot, you can only see the North Window, but you can see the South Window when you get up to the Turret Arch.

*North & South Windows – walk to them after you go to the Turret Arch. They are fun to climb up & sit on. We watched the sun set from here🤩

This was a full day, but we knew we didn’t have as much going on the next day. We stayed in the park until about 9:45! We waited for the stars to come out and laid down on the rocks to look at them. It’s a great place to see the night sky because it is so dark out here. We easily found the Little Dipper.

We stayed at Holiday Inn Express in Moab again tonight.

WEDNESDAY ~

This morning, we left around 9:30 heading to Bryce Canyon National Park. It was about a 4.5 hour drive. We saw a lot of the same (beautiful and interesting) landscape along the way. At one point, we were at 7,886 ft elevation. I think that’s the highest elevation we had been on this trip.

We stopped at the Love’s in Salina that had an Arby’s to get gas and lunch. We arrived at the Bryce Canyon visitor center a little after 2:00.

When we walked up to see Bryce Canyon for the first time, I thought it was absolutely beautiful! I just loved the light terra-cotta colors.

The main hike we wanted to do in Bryce Canyon NP was the Queen’s Garden/Navajo Loop hike. We started at Sunrise Point, walked to Sunset Point on the Rim Trail, and descended into the canyon on the Queens Garden Trail. We ascended on the Navajo Loop via Wall Street. Whew, what a hike!😰 It was the toughest one we did all week. It is a must-do because it is amazing to see the hoodoos and the Douglas Fir trees from the canyon floor, but the ending will have you huffing & puffing! And make sure you take lots of water with you! It’s 2.9 miles total, and it’s a dusty/dirty trail. We had dirt all over the back of our legs & in our socks & shoes. Here’s a link with good info about this hike:

https://www.nps.gov/brca/planyourvisit/qgnavajocombo.htm

If you want to stay inside Bryce Canyon NP, I would check out Bryce Canyon Lodge. It’s in a great location.

After our hike, we drove to Springdale where we had the best meal of the trip – dinner at Porter’s. We highly recommend it! We stayed at the Hampton Inn & Suites in Springdale. It was a really nice hotel, and we enjoyed the city of Springdale a lot.

I want to tell you this about the drive from Bryce Canyon National Park to Springdale: You will enter Zion National Park from the East, before you get to Springdale (look at East Entrance in the picture below):

You will go through the Zion-Mt. Carmel tunnel and then Boom, there’s Zion. And it’s beautiful 😍

Then, the switchbacks take you down into Zion NP. If you are interested in doing the Canyon Overlook trail, go ahead and do it on your way in. It is BEFORE you go thru the tunnel. (The trail ends with a view of Pine Creek Canyon and lower Zion Canyon. There is limited parking for this trail.) We had thought about doing it on Thursday afternoon, but didn’t realize til after we were already in Zion, we would’ve needed to go all the way back up the switchbacks & go to the east entrance to do this trail and then all the way back down the switchbacks to head out of Springdale towards St. George. Springdale is to the South of Zion NP. You can see some of the Springdale shuttle stops in brown on the map above. I think our hotel was at Springdale Shuttle Stop #6.

THURSDAY ~

We were able to leave our vehicle at the hotel this morning, and we headed out at 7:15 am. We took the Springdale Shuttle to the Zion National Park visitors center. Then we took the Zion Shuttle to the last stop (#9) and walked the Riverside Walk. It was so pretty 😌 There are several places to stop along the way and take pictures by the river.

My favorite part was at the end of the Riverside Walk, where The Narrows begins:

The Riverside Walk is rated as an easy trail. We would say very easy. It’s just a 2-mile roundtrip casual walk on a paved path beside the river. We were in the shade the whole walk and were actually kinda chilly! I was surprised at how many people were continuing the hike into the water on The Narrows trail, but I know it would be an amazing hike if you plan ahead and have all the gear😊 It takes a few hours to complete, and you have to be aware of deadly flash flooding that can occur😳

Next, we did the Middle Emerald Pools trail. Let’s just say we found the sun! After being in the shade all morning, this was completely different! Don’t forget to take water with you on this hike (or any hike). It was rated as moderate and we would agree. It’s probably more on the moderate/strenuous side. It had several places that were uphill. During our time at Zion, the bridge at shuttle stop #5 was closed, so we got off the shuttle at stop #6 and started the trail there, via Kayenta Trail. This made the hike a little longer – right at 2 miles total.

By the time this hike was over, we were tired and about ready for lunch. We ate a sandwich and then went back to Porter’s for ice cream and some souvenir shopping 😊

Then…. we left the national parks for the last time🥲 But the fun wasn’t over. We drove one hour to St. George, Utah, where we were staying two nights at The Inn at Entrada. This is where High School Musical 2 was filmed 🎶 Our rooms were awesome. It was like having a whole house. The view from our back patio was awesome ☺️

Thursday night, we drove 15 min back into town to eat at Pieology and to pick up some things to cook the next morning for breakfast.

FRIDAY ~

A day to rest, recover & rejuvenate! We stayed at The Inn all day. We played pickleball, swam, and laid by the pool.

Saturday morning, we drove to Las Vegas to fly back to Atlanta. We gained an hour on this drive. We left at 7:00, which was 6:00 Las Vegas time. We changed time zones several times on this trip and were confused pretty much every time 😂 The confusion was mostly due to whether daylight savings time was being observed in that area or not.

Sunday, we went to the Braves game at noon. Braves won 3-1! Then it was time to go home & get back to the real world 🙃

We covered over 1,000 miles this week (not counting flying) and packed in a lot, but it never felt rushed. We had plenty of time to do all the things we had planned.

It’s amazing to see all of these beautiful places right here in our own country! National Parks are a wonderful place to take children. They can explore the outdoors, and my favorite thing is: getting to see something new every day! But they’re not just great for kids; we have loved them as adults too! I have to admit, I used to think National Parks?😬 that sounds boring🫣 But I didn’t realize how beautiful they are and how much they have to offer as far as activities and fun! Our God created a great big world, and we want to go see new parts of it every chance we get😊

We were able to use our Southwest points to book all of our flights, so we really just had the cost of our hotels, rental car, our 2 tours, food, and the cost of getting into the parks. And we used timeshare points for our first two nights, so that helped as well. Here’s a link to info on park entry fees:

https://www.nps.gov/planyourvisit/passes.htm

The America The Beautiful Pass is an annual pass and is great if you will be visiting several parks. If you have a 4th grader, the parks are basically free! That’s a great time to take your kiddos ☺️ And that’s probably a great age to start. We did see a few families with younger kids but I would be nervous about some of the hikes because of the drop-offs if my kids were really young😬 I think there were places to picnic at every park we have visited. So you could bring breakfast, lunch & snack items, and something to grill for supper to save money on food.

We were so thankful to be blessed with perfect weather on this trip😌 One day, we had about 5 rain drops hit the windshield, but besides that, it was sunny & warm – hot a few times. Friday in St George, it was 98° but humidity was extremely low, so it wasn’t like 98° in Alabama. It was hot, but bearable. We didn’t sweat near as much out here!

It is VERY dry here. We were warned about the dry air when we went to Yellowstone/Grand Teton/Jackson Hole 3 summers ago but did not notice it too much. But on this trip, our skin got incredibly dry, and our lips got chapped! Make sure you bring plenty of lotion & chapstick!

Other helpful things to take:

We took rolls of quarters and did laundry at the hotel Monday night. This helped us cut down on the amount of clothes we needed to take.

Bring an insulated, refillable water bottle. Yes, they are heavier than a plastic one, but they will keep ice frozen/water cold much longer. You will drink a LOT of water on this trip. Our kids both took a hydration backpack, which has a tube that allows you to easily drink water without having to worry about a water bottle, but they didn’t use them after the first day – because, who wants to drink hot water? 😬 I don’t know of a way you could keep the water cold.

We took 2 small coolers (inside our suitcases) so that we would have them when we got there. They were very handy to keep waters & cold food in. We took one, & my parents brought the other one in their suitcase. Just stuff socks, toiletries or whatever else inside, to get them there 😁 We did purchase a small styrofoam cooler with our Walmart pickup because it was about an hour & a half drive from that Walmart to where we stayed in Sedona & I didn’t want to chance anything ruining on the way.

Utah also has Capital Reef National Park. We just chose four of Utah’s “Big Five” parks to visit on this trip. We got pictures of most of the places we went, but somehow missed the Arches National Park entrance sign.

We loved this trip!! 🧡💚