Can it Be Done in 4 days? Las Vegas trip March 1st 2010 thru 5th-ish.

[dynamiteburn]

Hello everyone. I am flying in to Las Vegas. I would like to do as follows: Las Vegas to Badwater in Death Valley (pictures) then to Los Angeles, CA then to see Salvation Mountain/Slab City/Salton Sea in Niland, CA then to Joshua Tree Nat'l Park (pictures/brief) then to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon then to see the Barringer Meteor Crater (brief) then to Petrified Forest (pictures) then turn around and head back towards Las Vegas to see Lake Mead and Hoover Dam (brief), finally back to my hotel room. I have a total of 4 days to complete this in. According to Google maps, it is roughly 1,700 miles round trip and about 1 day, 9 hrs worth of driving. If someone could help me out or give hints and suggestions, please help out. I have from March 1st thru the 5th to complete this journey.

[Lifemagician]

Google maps has not actually driven through the nightmare that is LA traffic... day and night.

Lifey would add quite a lot of time to that estimate

[Southwest Dave]

Neither does a computer need to eat, sleep or fill up with gas !

Realistically 1700 miles is 3 days driving plus any time sitting in LA traffic so you really are not going to have time to see anything other than out of the car window. I personally would recommend choosing between a loop through Death valley to LA and back through Joshua tree or to Grand canyon, Petrified forest and Monument valley, going on the places you have listed.

Another option would be Grand canyon through page/Lake Powell to Bryce canyon and Zion NP and back down to Vegas.

Have a look around for ideas and enjoy the RTA pages !

[Midwest Michael]

Sorry, but I have to agree with the prior posts. This trip as you've laid out just isn't possible. I think Dave's suggestion of either doing a loop to the west, to DV, LA, and Joshua Tree or to the East to Hoover Dam, Grand Canyon, etc is really about the best you can do. Either of those will still be extremely full trips for 4 days, but they could certainly work.