Denver to Sun City West

[COTravel]

Hi everyone, I'm planning a road trip this summer from Morrison, CO (a suburb of Denver) to Sun City West, a retirment community in Arizona, to see my grandparents. I made this trip once when I was in high school with my mom, but that was almost ten years ago and I don't really remember much of the trip. Anyone taken this route? Any advice for me? It has been years since I have been on any roadtrip.

[Robert Schaller]

Depends on what kind of a trip you want to make of it -- there are several really good routes and a dozen variations on them). If speed is of the essence, then use I-25, I-40 and I-17 -- this route is marginally faster than the others.

My experienced guess is the second fastest route is west on I-70 to US191, take that down through Moab to US160 at Kayenta, then through Tuba City and Flagstaff to I-17. This is also a very spectacular route (although none of these are ugly or boring) and it is one of my favorites.

You could also go west on I-70 to SR91, go south through Leadville & Buena Vista down to US160, and take that west over Wolf Creek Pass through Durango and down across the Navajo Reservation to Flagstaff and pick up I-17 there. A variation on this one is to go west on US50 from Poncha Springs and then take US550 down to Durango. Last summer there were quite a few areas of construction on US160 -- and my guess is there still are (big projects). You might check out CO's Dept of Transportation site or use this link to check it out. Last year, I wasn't held up more than a few minutes at a time -- maybe 20 minutes or so at the site of some tunnel construction on the eastern slope above South Fork.

Plan on about a day and a half for the trip -- and if you're a camper there's lots of great opportunities for that along this route. Bob

[COTravel]

Thanks for the advice. I'm pretty sure the last time I was there I took the very direct route of I-25 to I-40 to I-17. I wasn't even aware of those other routes you mentioned. I think since I have a resonable amount of time to make the trip I will take the more scenic route you gave. Thanks a lot for the help!