San Jose to Grand Canyon 16-day trip plan

[adv4fun]

Hi,

I find this forum is tremendous helpful on planning my summer trip. After reading many of similar threads, below is my trip plan. I am looking forward to your input/suggestions/comments :-).
July 16: leaving san jose, driving to Yosemite, stay in valley for 16&17
July 18: after lunch, driving to Barstow via 395 for the night
July 19: driving to Zion Canyon (bypass Las Vegas), stay for the night
July 20: Driving to GC, stay in the park for 20&21
July 22: Driving to LV, stay for the night
July 23:Driving to San Diego, stay for 23&24
July 25: Driving to Long Beach for a 4-day Mexico Cruise, departing at 5:30pm, back 8AM of 29th
July 29: Driving to LA, stay for the night
July 30: Driving to Heart Castle in the afternoon, need to find a place to say(where is a good place?)
July 31: Driving home via Camel, 17 miles/Monterery

This is a rough draft, i wonder if i am driving too aggressively? Also need advice on where to go for each day..

we are pretty familiar with Yosemite/LA/SD area, been to LV many times so not so into SV. For all
other areas, still pretty new to us.

Also for driving route, i wonder if there is any particular route I should avoid?

Thanks for your time on reading. Thanks in advance for your reply:-)

[Southwest Dave]

Hello and welcome to the RTA forums !

A couple of things that stand out to me is going all the way South to Barstow and then back up to Zion. Is there a reason for going to Barstow ? You will also be driving right by Vegas to get to Zion, but then you are adding miles by going there betwen GC and SD.

Other than those and the fact that you will have very little time in Zion NP [which is wonderful] which could be helped without going so far South from Yosemite, you have a very nice trip planned.

[glc]

To get to Zion from Yosemite without going through LV, go over Tioga Pass and continue on CA-120 to US-6. Take that to Warm Springs, then NV-375 (The E.T. Highway) to US-93. Take that south to NV-168 to I-15 (Alternate - take 93 north to NV-319/UT-56 to Cedar City). Your only real overnight option would be Tonopah, there are 3 hotels listed there on hotels.com.

For lodging near Hearst Castle, the most economical choices would be in San Simeon. Cambria is a lot nicer town to stay in, but also more costly.

[Midwest Michael]

July 18: after lunch, driving to Barstow via 395 for the night

I'm think you might mean Bishop here? Barstow would make sense if you were "going around" via Bakersfield, but it isn't on 395 and there would really be no way to Bypass Vegas between Barstow and Zion. Plus since this is a July trip, I'd hope you were planning to go over Tioga Pass.

[adv4fun]

Hello and welcome to the RTA forums !

A couple of things that stand out to me is going all the way South to Barstow and then back up to Zion. Is there a reason for going to Barstow ? You will also be driving right by Vegas to get to Zion, but then you are adding miles by going there betwen GC and SD.

Other than those and the fact that you will have very little time in Zion NP [which is wonderful] which could be helped without going so far South from Yosemite, you have a very nice trip planned.

The reason to going south all the ways to Barstow is because we want to have sight-seeing along 395. Originally we planned to cross death valley but felt it's too hot to cross in July. So we changed the route. If we choose to take another route, what's the better option? We could stay in LV for 1 night on the way to Zion. Also could add another night in Zion.

[adv4fun]

Thanks for your suggestion. Yeah, maybe Tioga Pass is a better option. We will take that.

[adv4fun]

True.. will take Tioga pass instead. thx for your input :-)

[Southwest Dave]

You are correct in thinking that Death valley will be hot, but there would be no reason not to drive across this amazing landscape. You could stop in Lone Pine the night and drive across early in the day before it gets hot and continue to Zion. In my opinion it will be far more rewarding than going down to Barstow and less miles. I would leave Yosemite valley before lunch so that you have time to enjoy the Tioga pass [CA120] which is a big part of the Yosemite experience. From Lone Pine you can cross DV on 190 and if you wanted to go direct to Zion you could head around the Northern tip of LV via CA127/NV373 to US 95 from Death valley junction, or if you were to stop in Vegas to save the detour from GC to SD, take State line/Ash Meadows rd/Bell Vista Ave to Pahrump from DV junction and 160 to Vegas.

If you really don't want to cross DV, glc's recommended route through Tonopah etc is an interesting desert drive.

[adv4fun]

Thanks Dave for your suggestion of crossing DV.

After looking at statistics of July temp in DV, the average is 120F, lowest is around 95F(around 3-4AM?). Around 6AM, it's going to be above 100F. I am a little worried that it won't be as enjoying as I want to be :-). What if AC is not working (most likely won't happen), but if it does, it's going to be life-threating.. Flat-tire seems quite common? might not be worthy of taking the risk? Maybe i am a little too conservative? Though I really want to experience DV landscape ...

I will definitely take Tioga pass. Thanks a lot for suggesting the route from GC to SD which is the area I am not confident at all. also not familiar with LV to Zion, Zion to GC route..

[Midwest Michael]

I really think you are worried way too much about Death Valley. First of all, you've got some numbers that aren't quite right. The average high is 115 in July while the average low is 86. Second, you need to remember that Death Valley is the hottest of the hot, but the entire area is a very hot desert. Barstow, for example has an average July high of 103, Las Vegas' average July high is 106. And of course, these are averages, what you actually see could be 20 degrees higher or lower!

If you decide not to go to Death Valley, then I still can't see why you'd go all the way down to Barstow. That's adding a good 100 extra miles vs. crossing Nevada via US-6 as suggested above, or even heading east at Big Pine and then down towards Vegas via Beatty.