Road Trip Utah: 5 Day Itinerary

Erin Palek
Jan 24, 2021
6 min read

Updated: Nov 16, 2021

Utah, I will be back. This is my favorite trip to date! I went on this road trip with my best friend Taylor in September - starting and ending in Salt Lake City. Keep on reading for some trip highlights and a link to our full travel itinerary.

Trip Highlights: Salt Lake City, Capitol Reef National Park, Lower Calf Creek Falls, Bryce Canyon National Park, and Zion National Park.

Drive Time: Around 13 hours and 30 minutes (not including time we got lost!)

Travel Tip: Purchase a National Park Pass ahead of time for only $80. Entrance fees to National Parks are typically $35 - so the pass is worth it if you're hitting up multiple parks like we did!

Weather: September was perfect for hiking and being outdoors day and night! It was 70's in the day, and evenings dropped to the 50's.

Getting Around: I would recommend getting a rental with 4WD because some of the routes are very off-road! (We somehow managed in Taylor's Kia Forte and it made for a good story).

The parks we wanted to hike were relatively close for driving, so it was our goal to cover as much ground possible in our short time! I will 100% do this route again, but I would definitely plan to add on another day or two to account for some time to relax and recharge along the way... Because this trip was hectic.

Download the itinerary below for an overview our trip. If you don't know where to start with planning a Utah road trip, maybe this will be helpful for you!

Day 1: Arrive in Salt Lake City & Visit Park City, UT

The SLC airport is JUST outside of the city - super easy to navigate to and from. After landing in the afternoon, I spent the day getting us groceries and prepared the car for our road trip. We packed 2 portable coolers in the backseat for easy access with enough non-perishable snacks, sandwiches and drinks to last us the whole weekend. We kept 5 jugs of water in the trunk - which worked out great for whenever we needed to fill up our water bottles... or brush our teeth.

We freshened up for the evening and visited with our friend Amy! For dinner, we drove about 40 minutes to Park City, UT. I would definitely like to go back to this area to spend more time. This town is nestled in the valley of the mountains and has a long strip of restaurants, bars, and cute shops. We didn't have reservations so we just followed the live music and ended up at a pub where we got brick oven pizzas.

That night we drove back to Taylor's Airbnb and stayed overnight in Salt Lake City.

Day 2: Capitol Reef National Park to Escalante, UT

Wake up EARLY! The earlier the better. Make sure you have everything in your car for the weekend, and drive 3.5 hours to Capitol Reef National Park. I was pleasantly surprised with this drive, because it was a lot more scenic than I thought it'd be! I knew nothing about Capitol Reef, until my well-traveled-friend Josh recommended it to us. And wow, this park left me speechless.

First of all, you must stop at Dark Sky Coffee in Torrey, UT for some fuel. You'll drive through this town just before entering Capitol Reef. The view is great, and it's just a cute little drive-up coffee place on the side of the road.

Enter Capitol Reef National Park and stop at the Visitor's Center for a park map!

We first hiked the Hickman Bridge Trail (maybe 1 hour) and then the Cassidy Arch Trail (about 3 hours). Definitely hike Cassidy Arch. This trail literally looked and felt like we were walking on Mars - the view of the arch at the end of the trail is totally worth it.

After spending the day hiking - we left Capitol Reef around 5pm and drove 1.5 hours to Escalante, UT. TIP: If I were to do this route again, I would recommend spending more time in the park and stay the night in Capitol Reef or the town of Torrey.

The Drive from Capitol Reef to Escalante was VERY scenic on Route 12. We saw a lot of wild cows! But once the sun went down, driving through the mountains in the dark got a LITTLE scary. This is why I would recommend staying near Capitol Reef and drive to Escalante in the morning instead.

We stayed in an Airbnb cabin at the Escalante RV Park. It actually was perfect. There were a few restaurants in town, including a little walk-up market where we bought wine. For dinner we just ate our sandwiches we had packed in our cooler. Also, the morning view from the cabin porch was....*chefs kiss*

Day 3: Lower Calf Creek Falls, Bryce Canyon, to Virgin, UT

My favorite day. Get up EARLY, pack up the car, and drive only 25 minutes to the Lower Creek Falls Trailhead. To park at the trail, you'll need your National Park Pass, or just $5 cash. This hike was - awesome - and took us about 4 hours total round trip. The entire trail was SAND, so this made the trail a little tricky and very hot. Pack a lunch to sit and enjoy at the waterfall! We didn't want to get wet because we had a full day of travel ahead of us.

TIP: Wear a bathing suit under your hiking clothes or something you can get wet! We didn't realize there was a large swimming hole at the bottom of the waterfall.

After hiking, we drove stumbled upon Kiva Koffeehouse - an absolute dream lunch spot. This little walk-up cafe sits right on the mountain top with 360 degree views in Escalante! My photos don't do this scenery justice, and the food was SO GOOD. I cannot recommend this place enough. This was hands down the best meal we had our entire trip.

From here, we drove about 55 minutes to Bryce Canyon National Park. We didn't have much time to spare because we had to get to our Airbnb before sunset. So we just drove through Bryce Canyon on the Scenic Drive for about an hour and stopped at a few of the lookout points. I would definitely go back to Bryce to spend more time and actually do a hike, but we more-so just wanted to see park from the lookouts this time around!

From Bryce Canyon, we drove 2 hours to Virgin, UT. Drive Route 89 because you'll ride through a couple of these these arch tunnels!

This 2 hour drive from Bryce Canyon to Virgin, UT was a little bit of a sh*t show - we got lost trying to locate our off-grid Airbnb. It now makes for a great story, but boy it was stressful trying to beat the sunset and find our tent before it got dark!

This part of the trip is why I would recommend getting a rental with 4WD because the tent was LITERALLY off-the-grid up in the mountains.

Our Airbnb Tent in Virgin, UT was located just 25 minutes outside of Zion.

Day 4: Zion National Park

The morning views were insane! We geared up for the day to head into Zion National Park.

Stop in Springdale to fuel up for the day before entering the park - there are tons of food options! It's best to get to Zion EARLY because this park is very popular and finding a parking spot was a hassle. We ended up renting bikes to ride to and from the trailhead. If you prefer riding the shuttle, reserve your tickets online ahead of time!

We biked 4 miles to the Grotto Trailhead where we hiked up to Scout Lookout. Unfortunately due to Covid, the rest of the trail to Angels Landing was closed off. This roundtrip hike to Scout Lookout took us 3 hours. IF we were able to continue on to Angels Landing, I would add on another hour. There were times I really wanted to quit on this hike... but Taylor kept me going and the 360 degree views at the top were absolutely worth every step.

After this day of biking 8 miles and hiking 5 miles, we deserved a large cold beer and burger at the Zion Brewery. With three days of adventuring, we were ready to relax for the rest of the night. Buffalo Trails Trading Co was the only general store in Virgin, UT - we stopped here for some ice and essentials on our way back up to our tent for the night. The hospitality in this joint was just superb.

We got back to our tent just in time to shower, open a cold beer, and wait for the stars to come out. I'm not exaggerating when I say the sky was full of stars from one edge of the earth to the other - this night was the ultimate highlight of the trip.

Day 5: Return to Salt Lake City & Recharge

This was our last travel day and our longest single drive of the whole trip being 4 hours from Zion straight north to Salt Lake. Driving on a straight highway at this point - instead of weaving through mountains - made it an easy drive back home.

On the way back, you MUST stop at the unlikely attraction situated at the Flying J gas station in Scipio, Utah, off exit 188 on I-15 — you'll be surprised to find a petting zoo. Taylor's favorite part of the whole trip. LMAO

Once we returned to Salt Lake City, we spent our last night at dinner where we reminisced about all our adventures and memories from the weekend.

Leave a comment or message me if you have any questions about this trip!

XO, Erin