Off Season in Utah National Parks with a Nevada pit stop

We like off season travel and have learned to roll with the unexpected- mostly weather related.

Our routing:
Las Vegas-St George- Moab-Springdale (Zion)-Las Vegas
St George stop broke the trip north after a long day of flying.

Moab was home base for 10 days. From here, we covered

• All the sections of Arches NP
• Canyonlands Island in the Sky (Needles was generally inaccessible due to icy roads)
• Hwy 128 N of Moab- amazing sites along the Colorado River including the Grandstaff Canyon;
• Potash (with excellent view from the roadways of the US DOE uranium mine tailings remediation project;
• the rather scary ascent of La Sal Mountain Loop Road after a snow fall.

Weather was cool, windy with unexpected snow squalls. So we took our time and thoroughly enjoyed the combo of drive- walk- drive.

After Moab area, we drove down to Springdale for 2 nights to tour Zion NP and area. Off season in Zion means you can drive your own car to the various trails. Unexpected: capacity limits on car entry due to the dearth of parking spots. And ice on the trails- something we did not experience as much further north. Parking restrictions generally lifted by mid afternoon which allowed us to see almost everything we want to see. It also allowed us time to experience the Zion-Mount Carmel Tunnel and the spectacular scenic views along this roadway.

Final stop to enjoy geology was Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada on our way back to LV. Yet another scenic drive with different features; and accessible hiking paths.

All in all, a great couple of weeks of relaxed touring of spectacular natural phenomena.

Other than Valley of Fire, all parks were accessible with the annual NP pass- a great investment of US$80.