LA-Grand Canyon-Phoenix

[ToddB]

I am in the final stages of planning an August vacation out west. The trip is 10 days total flying into LA and out of Phoenix. I need to keep 4 kids entertained, ranging from 7-14 years old. I am an occassional business traveller to LA so I have a rough plan for that area, but tips always welcome.

The time table is:

Day 1 (Saturday) Land in LA. Do LA area until check out Tuesday AM.

Day 4 (Tuesday) Make our way east toward Grand Canyon. I have Wednesday and Thursday nights booked at a Canyon village hotel. What we do on Tuesday and Wednesday is still open. Is it worth diverting a bit and staying in Vegas Tuesday night? It looks like it adds about 1.5 hours of travel time, but then we could also see the Hoover Dam. The other plan was to head straight to the GC, but spend the night in the Barstow/Mojave area. Any suggestions? Is there a good way to explore the Mojave for a half day? No hotel lined up for either route yet.

Day5-7 At the Canyon. Any tips for exploring the Canyon? I have found a lot of info in early threads.

Day 7-Check out of hotel and start to head toward Phoenix via Sedona. I thought we would spend Friday night in Sedona and then on to Phoenix.

Day 8-10 We fly out from Phoenix on Tuesday morning.

I am wondering if I try to change my reservation at the Canyon up a night to give me two nights in Vegas?

Any other ideas or thoughts? Great forum by the way.

TB

[Midwest Michael]

Welcome to the RTA Forum!

One possibility you might enjoy to spend some time out in the Desert, is to visit Joshua Tree NP near Palm Springs. From there you could head to the Grand Canyon, via Lake Havasu City (see the London Bridge).

If you head straight for the Canyon, I would probably want to get farther than Barstow. I like Barstow a lot, because of its Route 66 charms, but you'd only be about 2 hours out LA, and it would leave you with a very long day of driving to the Canyon. If you wanted to do a stopover, I'd try to find a place a little farther along the way - perhaps Needles, Kingman, or even Laughlin, NV.

[W. Larrison]

Hello ToddB

Just as a note, it'll be warm in the desert in August -- probably around 100F. So be prepared. (*laughing at myself* My usual cautionary note to folks it seems...) Drink lots of water!!

Given a couple of extra days in SoCal, you have some options on where you might go, or what to do.

Given an extra day and a night, you might go up the coast through Santa Barbara to Hearts Castle, near San Luis Obispo. That's a several hour drive from LA, but very doable, and lets you see Santa Barbara Mission, some of the Coast, and Hearst Castle, plus perhaps the Elephant Seal Colony at Pedros Blancos about 10 miles north of Hearst Castle. From the San Simeon area (Hearst Castle area) you can cut east across the state to Las Vegas, with a drive of around 7 hours drive time (plus gas, food, sightseeing, bathroom stop times) -- that's compared to 5 hours drive time from LA to Las Vegas.

Another option given an extra day and a night is to swing up to Sequoia National Park, or even Yosemite, before heading for Vegas.

Or if you want to spend time in the desert, you have the option of swinging through Palm Springs, and thence up along the Colorado River to Vegas, or going through Joshua Tree National Park, or visiting Death Valley, or the Mojave National Preserve. Again, I do want to just point out it will be hot in the desert in August, and that you should be prepared for it. Desert visits and driving, even in the high summer, is very doable -- but you need to be prepared with extra water, a cell phone, and a vehicle in good mechanical shape. To just about everywhere the roads are paved and usually in pretty good shape, and there are lots of services along the main roads. I'd be more careful about going off the paved path just in case in the summer, just in case.

[ToddB]

Thanks to both for the ideas. No matter how we go I will take plenty of water!