Greetings all, starting to plan our summer trip this year and looking for a few pointers. My wife and I celebrated our 20th this past November and her wish was for a trip to two of our favorite areas (Zion and the Tetons) without the kids. Work schedule means it had to wait until this summer.
The plan so far is to not do much planning, and just to head west, not too different from our usual trips. Here's what I have so far, and it's a very rough estimate of what we'd like to do. I realize many of you will say SLOW DOWN, but we usually like to cover a lot of ground when we travel. We rarely stay in one place two nights. We have 16 days to explore this year.
Days 1/2: Home to Denver area
Day 3: Resupply, refresh and probably head West across 50 to the Gunnison area.
Day 4: Explore around Ouray/Silverton.
Day 5: Go over Imogene Pass to Telluride. Big off-road loop day.
Day 6: Head down to Durango.
Day 7: Keep rolling west to Monument Valley maybe, or see some things we haven't North of there, such as Natural Bridges or more of the south side of Canyonlands. I could use some input here. There are lots of possibilities and we could certainly slow down in this area. I know The Wave, Antelope Canyons and other cool stuff are in this area but not sure about the lotteries in Summer. Claude, just tell us where to go and point the camera.
Day 8,9: Zion, Bryce area hiking and exploring, though our love of Zion may keep us there only and for longer.
Day 10/11: Start north towards Jackson. We plan on taking 89 up to about Park City and branching off east into the Uinta/Wasatch mountains for a quick tour. Thanks Macmcintire!
Day 12/13/14: Spend in the Tetons. Hike and explore.
Day 15/16: Head home. I'd really love to run up the east side of Yellowstone, no reason to spend much time there, and do the Beartooth Hwy out of the Northeast entrance. This idea may be a stretch for this trip as it only adds to our driving time home. We will more than likely just slow down a bit more in the Tetons and take 287 to 80 east to home.
Thanks for any input.