Western trip, starting point?
Hello wonderful knowledgable travelers. You’ve helped out before so I want to pick collective brains again. I want to do a western trip next year, mid May 2021 time frame. I really want to see the Utah Five, or as many parks as possible there but also combine it with visiting family in Los Angelos area (Pasadena) as well as Las Vegas. Does it make sense to fly in and out of Los Vegas so a car rental is the same drop off? I’m thinking of flying in then immediately head to LA to see family, then head off to Utah. No interest in Grand Canyon unless it’s the north rim as we’ve been to the south rim. We could then head back to Los Vegas and visit the family there before flying home. Does this make sense logistically? Don’t have a set time length (hurrah for retirement) so excluding days for family time, how many days would something like this take? Interests in the park is site seeing, not much hiking, probably schedule some day/half day tours. I know there’s a lot here on the Utah parks so will be reading the other threads too. Right now I’m just trying to figure out if this even makes sense to do. My other thought was instead of returning to Vegas, continue on after Utah to Denver to visit family there and fly out from there but then I’m guessing the car rental goes up due to a different drop off as well as the flight is not a round trip, if that makes any difference anymore. Denver could be a totally different time as we do get there more frequently. Thanks.
The more time the better imo.
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Right now I’m just trying to figure out if this even makes sense to do.
It makes perfect sense to me ! (After all we are a bunch or road trippers ! Haha)
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I really want to see the Utah Five, or as many parks as possible there but also combine it with visiting family in Los Angelos area (Pasadena) as well as Las Vegas. Does it make sense to fly in and out of Los Vegas so a car rental is the same drop off? I’m thinking of flying in then immediately head to LA to see family, then head off to Utah.
If you want to start by visiting family then flying into LA makes the most sense to me, unless you can get better deals starting elsewhere. You could do a complete loop or finishing in Las Vegas may not add one way drop off fees as it's a popular route. From LA you could go through Joshua Tree NP and head towards Monument valley and to Moab for Arches and Canyonlands, then Capitol reef, Bryce canyon and Zion before heading back to Vegas.
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so excluding days for family time, how many days would something like this take?
Hmm. How longs a piece of string ? It could be done in a week, but a minimum of 10 days I would recommend and if you can afford longer go for it !! As things become clearer and your trip takes shape we can help with the finer details.
A Loop is a Loop is a Loop
If where you're returning the rental car is a consideration, and it always should be, then it doesn't matter logistically where you fly in to/out of. You're going to be driving the exact same number of miles as you make the complete loop. What you should be looking at then is the combined cost of the airfares and car rental. You might save by flying into Los Angeles or Las Vegas. Even Phoenix or Salt Lake City (both of which would add a few miles) might end up being more affordable. You've got a while to make a final decision, but I wouldn't wait too long to look into this because any low fares will disappear quickly (as they normally do) plus prices will tend to rise as people start to travel again while capacity is still not up to where it was before the COVID pandemic
AzZBuck
