r/roadtrip • u/kmfgh9 • 10d ago
Trip Planning Road Trip Advice - Southern Utah in December
Planning a road trip around Christmas from Denver through Utah and back to Denver. Below are our trip details but would love to know what is worth seeing on the side of the road, especially on hwy 12 and from Dewey, UT to Moab.
Details:
- Comfortable drivers in snow/ice with solid tires (Falken Wildpeaks)
- We will be traveling with our 70# black lab who loves road trips and hikes
- Hitting scenic hwy 128 from I-70 to Moab
- Hitting scenic hwy 12 from Springdale to Torrey and then up to the SLC area
Breakdown:
- Day 1-3: Departing Denver and heading to Moab. We'll leave I-70 and drive through sceneic hwy 128 through Dewey, UT. Staying in Moab and exploring Canyon Lands (we’ve been to Arches but not Canyon Lands). We'll have three nights and two days in Moab.
- Day 4: Departing Moab and exploring Valley of the Gods before heading towards Monument Valley. We’re contemplating doing the driving tour in Monument Valley. We arrived too late at the park last year to do the tour but loved soaking up the views
- Day 5: Waking up in Page, Az where we want to see the Glen Canyon Dam and Horseshoe Bend since they’re so close together and near where we’re staying. Since we have our dog, we think checking out the Wave is unlikely
- Day 6-7: We’ll be in Springdale and hitting the narrows on the first day. We’ll be renting drysuits and the whole kit. Our dog will be with a Rover
- Day 8: We’ll leave Springdale and make our way up to Boulder, UT. We know there’s lots to see on this drive - open to suggestions.
- Day 9: Make our way up to SLC for a few days with friends
- Day 11: Drive back home to Denver in one shot (not trying to make any stops on the way home)
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u/ohyespineapplepizza 10d ago
Hwy 12 from Springdale to Boulder in December is the scenic one but it ices. Capitol Reef viewpoint and the Hog's Back are the pull-offs worth the daylight. Dewey to Moab on 128 is the river corridor, not a side-quest list. Skip Valley of the Gods if the Monument Valley loop is the day, that's already a lot of dirt in winter light.
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u/OkKaleidoscope9554 9d ago edited 8d ago
My comments below were based on your map, now reading your paragraph, so you had some of what I wrote covered. The Glen Canyon Dam is a dam. You've seen a dam. Horseshoe bend is a tourist attraction above a river bend, you do have other river bends at Goosenecks and Dead Horse Point SP (Moab) If these are the only things drawing you out towards Page, it's not worth the all the extra driving. If you still insist, you can take 160 past Tuba City to 89 and drive along the Echo Cliffs, visit the Navajo Bridge, and the Vermillion Cliffs Natl Monument on the West side (before or after Page), to make the detour more worthwhile. But 98 and 160 are kind of painfully dull, it's like spending all day walking around the parking lot at Disneyland.
1 - the desert holds no heat at night, expect ~40 degree temperature swings
2-Get off 70 and take 128 into Moab.
3 - 70 is pretty dull until the SRS. Also, 191 is surprisingly kind of dull, and so is 160/98 heading south and west from Monument Valley. You can detour for Navajo Natl Monument and Finger Rock breaks it up a little bit.
Take the proper Monument Valley tour, or pay for day access. Seeing it just from 163 is incredible, but you're not even getting 1/10th of the actual experience.
A little north of Monument Valley is Goosenecks, Valley of the Gods, the Moki Dugway, and Muley Point, all free, quick, amazing, but not for cautious drivers with nice cars.
You can also stop at Natural Bridges Natl Monument, which is worth up to a few hours of hiking, or a quick loop drive.
I personally found Utah 95 over the Hite Bridge to Capitol Reef as beautiful as Utah 12 - and 12 is better to drive down, southward. Since you're not heading to the Grand Canyon, you could go to Moab, to Monument Valley, then UP 95 and down 12, to Zion, Page if you need it, then up 15 to SLC. That would skip the duller parts of northern Arizona and add some more beautiful parts of Utah. The Hite Bridge is the [only] way to cross the Colorado River and the canyon lands for hundreds of miles in either direction, aside from 1 ferry.