Las Vegas to Zion ,Bryce then to Grand

I reach Las Vegas on Monday at 1200 and I should start off immediately from Las Vegas for Zion. Reach there by 400 ish. 4pm to 7 pm see Zion by driving around.

At 7 pm I shall set off for Bryce canyon. Reach at 1000 pm and settle in for the night.

The next morning, get up early and get in the views of Bryce Canyon , driving my own car all the time, not taking any shuttles and the like , because I am short of time.

By 1030 am I set off for Grand Canyon. Its a 6 hour drive to reach there, and thus I shall reach there by 430 pm. From 430 pm till 730 pm, I shall be seeing the grand canyon. At 730 pm shall set off for Las Vegas and reach Las Vegas by 1 30 am.



Qns:

1. This is doable. My calculation is that the main times of driving and seeing the canyons is the morning and the evening times at which the canyons shall look the most beautiful.

If you wanted to do this, how would you modify this trip??



2. I do know that after some time, people do get bored of seeing the same gorge, and thats why I am calculating to be around 2-3 hours at each Canyon.

Is it safe to be driving in that area at night…i.e are the roads good enough to be safe driving at night in the curves and the bends that accompany a gorge area?



  1. Would you say that some of the canyons are more DRIVABLE on ones own than the others…i.e some of them may require us to use a shuttle , which is not something I would like to do…I want to be using my own car and not shifting around. Are some of the canyons more drivable…i.e more of the beautiful parts of the canyons can be seen by driving rather than getting down and hiking and /or taking a shuttle. ??

Three hours at Grand Canyon, especially 4:30 to 7:30 in the evening does not justice. First, you are restricted at Grand Canyon with respect to where you can go with your car. Secondly, I think it gets dark this time of year around 5:30, so you won’t see much 5:30-7:30

I would do Zion and Bryce in one trip – they are most accessible by car, if my recollection is correct. Do Grand Canyon separately, or vice versa. Do only Grand and the others in a separate trip.

Alternative: visit Death Valley. We spent one full day there, and could have done more. Different kind of beauty than the three parks, but interesting nonetheless.

Have you checked the National Park Service sites to make sure you will have the access you think you will have?

If all you want to do is say you’ve seen them, then your timetable is doable, but if you really want to experience any of these places then you’re not allowing nearly enough time. I would suggest not trying to cram all into one trip. Select the one you want to see most and really explore it, including getting out of the car and walking around a bit.

Your schedule looks like it will only allow you to see the view from the north rim of the Grand Canyon. You probably alloted enough time for that. The best views are from the south side, for that you will need about 6 hours going from the east entrance to the south entrance. On that trip you could do the painted desert and the Petrified Forest to fill out the rest of the trip.

You cannot take your car at the south rim of the Grand Canyon or in Zion. When I was there you could take your car in Bryce 5 years ago.

UPDATE:

I have given up the plan of doing all the canyons in one trip. I am arriving at Las Vegas next Monday, shall explore vegas on Monday, Tuesday early morning set off for grand canyon ( 2 drivers). See it till sunset. Drive back to Vegas.

At the canyon I would like to drive around as much as possible.

Assuming you enter from the south, once you get to Canyon Villiage you can drive portions of the south rim, but that route will take you further to the east, toward Page. You would have to double back to exit the park heading toward Las Vegas. I strongly recommend that you take the shuttle bus that runs to the west at Canyon Village and get off periodically to walk the rim trail. That would give you a better experience and involve less driving.

Get out and walk the (South Rim of the) Grand Canyon. You will not be able to drive your own vehicle very much at all, but I do recommend taking the plethora of shuttle busses as they have so much more access to driving on the (controlled access) roads than you and your vehicle.

to get from vegas to the canyon is about a 5 hour drive. Weather could play a HUGE factor so take warm clothes and I would check road conditions before heading out.

Tom and Ray, we need a cleanup on aisle 4.

If I remember correctly, you can’t really get from the LV airport to Zion in 4 hours. The distance may make it seem possible, but it’s not.

And I think you gotta figure 6 hours from LV airport to the South Rim.

And don’t forget Death Valley.