Visiting family in Or and Kansas City, starting in Denver. Scenic trip advice

[rhaf]

Hi Folks, we are trying to plan a trip starting in Denver to visit family and friends in Portland Oregon and Kansas City.
Have been looking at various road combination options, but really need some help on this one.
Any suggestions on what would be the most scenic route to take? We have about 2½ weeks for the trip but obviously want to spend sometime with the friends and family. :-)
If possible we would like to see Devil's Tower.

We would love to hear from you and see what good suggestions we can receive.

Thank you in advance for your help!!

Regards,
Jan

[Midwest Michael]

Welcome to the RTA Forum!

Obviously the two places you have family are in opposite directions, and are a long ways apart. That leaves you a lot of options, and there certainly isn't just one best route possibility. I'm assuming that you are going to finish back in Denver at the end of the 2.5 weeks? Along those same lines, are you starting from Denver because you live there (and thus presumably don't want to spend much time focusing on attractions in Colorado that you could easily visit at another time?)

As a full loop, you're looking at somewhere around 3700 miles, so that's a good 7-8 full days of driving - sticking to the interstates. Obviously, you can break that up into smaller chunks, add more time by getting off the freeways, etc, but that gives you and idea of how much time you'll need just to cover the miles - so you'll have about 10 days to visit family and do some exploring.

For a route, I would probably start by heading to Portland via Salt Lake City. I-70 to US 6 would be a scenic option, I-25 to I-80 would be more straightforward. From SLC, I-15/I-84 would be the direct route to Portland.

Heading to KC, i would probably make my way to I-90 - giving you a different route than how you traveled west, and would take you near Devils Tower. Glacier, Yellowstone, the Badlands, along with the Mt. Rushmore and the rest of the Black Hills would be possible options.

Beyond the Badlands, you could take I-90 all the way to Sioux Falls, and then use I-29 down to KC - or you could look at any number of other possible 2 lane routes through the plains, perhaps cutting down through Nebraska.

Those, of course, aren't your only options, but it's a starting point to consider.