We will be spending three nights near Zion and four nights in Moab at the end of September. Flying in to LAS and out from Salt Lake City.
We love: hiking, biking and fine dining. We don’t love huge crowds. Seeking a list of must-sees and dos. Thanks for any suggestions and tips from those in the know.
Check out Cedar Breaks National Monument. Beautiful but gets less traffic than the National Parks.
My favorite was Arches National Park. Most stone arches in the world??? It was pretty spectacular. We went in March (pre-Pandemic) and it wasn’t crowded. Don’t know about other times of the years.
Many years ago when our kids were young we did a rafting day trip out of Moab.
In the fall of 2020 we ended up hitting up Zion, Bryce, and Grand Canyon (North Rim). The crowds weren’t hideous (though parking at one of the parks was…can’t remember which, but once you got into the park it wasn’t crowded). We really wanted to visit Antelope Canyon, but the reservation was closed to outsiders at the time.
We loved our stay IN Zion NP. It was one of the kids’ favorite national parks. It was just the right size, to them. There were moose and/or elk roaming around, I believe as well. The lodging wasn’t crazy expensive but you have to be lucky to book.
Dead Horse Point is worth the little detour. I’ve never biked it, but the guided bike tours look neat. You might consider booking with an outfitter to bike or raft to make things easy.
The last time we went to Arches, we got there at 7am and by the time we left the line to get in was nuts. The park is big so it can absorb lots of people but the trailhead parking lots get crowded.
Looks like they’re piloting ticketed (but free) entry now. You can enter without a ticket prior to 7am, and I’d get there as early as you can muster. It might still be hot in sept. Bring TONS of water (and snacks) and plan to spend lots time hiking around to get to whichever formations you want.
Delicate arch is the most famous and is a must-see. To get close, it’s a 3 mile roundtrip hike from the parking lot at the Wolfe Ranch trailhead, which will fill up quickly. So that would be one to hit early in the day. Devil’s garden parking can also get crowded.
The Arches website is quite helpful for planning your visit. Be sure to have some fry sauce while you’re in Utah!
Make sure you drive from Zion to Moab via Hwy 12 (go out of the Mt Carmel entrance and then up past Bryce Canyon and through Escalante), which is incredibly spectacular. It also takes you into Capitol Reef, which is my favorite national park in Utah because it is relatively undiscovered compared to the others. I would stop there for a few hours and get a fruit pie at the shop in Fruita (picked from their own orchard) then do the short hike into Capitol Gorge.
I assume you’ll do a day trip to Bryce Canyon from where you are staying near Zion? Don’t miss that.
In Arches National Park, don’t miss the ranger tour to Fiery Furnace. It was the best thing we did in Moab. Book in advance:
Reservations are now booked 7 days out on recreation.gov (you used to have to get them at the visitor center on arrival). Be online and ready at exactly 7am PT/8am MST/10am ET to get the tickets before they disappear.
We visited Grand Canyon, Zion, Bryce, Capitol Reef, and Arches about 10 years ago. We also hit Goblin Valley State Park, which we had to ourselves. Capitol Reef had very low crowds too. Would have loved to hike the Fiery Furnace at Arches but needed to book way in advance because it was ranger-led only (not sure if this is still the case). Devils Garden was a great trail.
We were in Moab less than two weeks ago and had and amazing day in Arches with barely any other people there. We took a couple of hikes (less than 3 miles each) to see various arches.
Since you will be visiting the parks during busier months I would plan out what you would like to see each day and start early.
H and I have been visiting many National Parks during the off season over the past 5 years and we have had so many wonderful hikes and views with no people anywhere around us.
Another place you may want to heck between Zion and Arches is Natural Bridges National Monument.
Three easy-to-access arches in different stages of development. Small camp ground and you can ride the circuit to see the bridges, (paved trail)
Great mountain biking all around Moab. The “dump trail” is famous for its views and challenging course.
There are numerous mountain bike trails going out of Dead Horse Point State :Park that have some spectacular scenery.
The Needles District of Canyonland National Park is just south of Moab. The best scenery is visible either via mountain bike trail or a high clearance 4 wheel drive vehicle past Elephant Hill. (The Hill is a real stopper and it requires some 4 wheel driving experience to get over because it the switches are very short and there’s portion where you need to drive in reverse up one switch.) However, even if don’t get past Elephant Hill there are plenty of day hikes to see petroglyphs and and desert vistas.
The Island in the Sky portion of Canyonlands National Oark is just past Dead Horse Point/Park north of Moab and takes you to a spectacular overlook of the confluence of the Colorado and Green Rivers. However, a high clearance 4 wheel drive vehicle is requires to get to the overlook. There’s a mountain bike circuit around the perimeter of the mesa that forms Island in the Sky. The ride is stunning–and difficult-- but it takes about 5 days to complete. (I’ve done it 3 times and D2 and her husband are planning on biking the circuit this fall. If you have a 4 wheel drive vehicle (high clearance not needed) and are confident driving skills you can take the jeep road from Dead Horse Point down off the mesa to the valley floor. This requires driving along a single lane wide jeep road with lots of exposure (no rails). I white knuckled it down while Dh drove and I occasionally got out to scout the route ahead.
An interesting quick stop during your trip is Newspaper Rock--an enormous collection of petroglyphs in Indian Creek Canyon about 15 miles west of US 191.
Ah, Utah! We visited in February about 12 years ago and it was magical. Our photos were all Instagram moments. We absolutely loved Goblin Valley. No one was there. It was the perfect combo of fun and mysterious. Our kids loved it. We visited Kodachrome Park, Zion, Bryce, Monument Valley, Arches, Capitol Reef. Before heading back to Vegas, we visited a proper ghost town, Grafton, not far from Zion.
I don’t have any food recs. We stayed in Escalante and literally had to eat gas station food one night because it was off season and nothing in town was open.
Try to stay right in Zion. We had the most fabulous cabin with a real fireplace, right in the park because we were there off season. In fact, go in February because it will be stunning. The downside is that you might get stuck somewhere due to snow. We didn’t worry about that.
We drove from Bryce to Moab through Escalante (and also Capitol Reef) and stopped to use a restroom at a gas station and ended up having a hot dog for lunch at the gas station in Escalante!
Hope you didn’t have the microwave burritos. Not good! 
I loved Natural Bridges (especially for being really remote and quiet), but it would require at least a couple of hours extra on the way from Zion to Moab (going south from Hanksville via Hite and Blanding rather than north via Green River) and probably wouldn’t leave enough time to see some of Capitol Reef that day as well. It might be just about doable as a long day trip from Moab.
I’d recommend a separate, longer trip to the Four Corners area: there’s a great loop from Green River to Capitol Reef NP, Natural Bridges, Mexican Hat (Moki Dugway and Monument Valley), Four Corners, Mesa Verde NP, Ouray (Million Dollar Highway), Black Canyon of the Gunnison NP and back through Grand Junction (Colorado NM). It’s usually easiest to fly into SLC though flying to Grand Junction would mean less driving (but typically a more expensive flight and rental car).
This was a loop we did from Las Vegas which missed the Ouray/Gunnison section (we visited those areas on a later trip starting in SLC), but went to Zion, Grand Canyon North Rim, Monument Valley, Four Corners, Mesa Verde, Natural Bridges, Capitol Reef, Bryce Canyon and Cedar Breaks (a lot of driving in 8 days):
You can easily do a stopover in Page between Zion and Moab.
Horseshoe Bend is an easy highway stop quick ‘must see’ though definitely commercialized now that IG has made it so famous.
There are many slot canyons besides Antelope, you can do Canyon X, Secret Canyon, Waterholes, etc. All are cool. Lower Antelope may be more interesting than upper, though, again, both have evolved into being quite touristy.
An Alstrom Point tour is great.
A boat tour of Lake Powell, especially to Rainbow Bridge is also worthwhile.
You can do a kayak rental at Antelope Point Marina and paddle up the lake filled section of Antelope Canyon, depending on the water level, you can get out at the end, but it’s not the true slot canyon there.
Feel free to PM me if you want canyon booking tips.
Agreed - when driving from Zion to Moab you have to decide between the southern route via Page and Monument Valley (380 miles/6.5 hours) or the northern route via Bryce, Hwy 12 and Capitol Reef (340 miles/6 hours) - the freeway (I-15 to I-70) is quite a bit quicker but misses the good sights. Personally I think that southern route deserves longer than one day, as its easy to spend half a day at Horseshoe Bend/Antelope Canyon near Page and another half day at Monument Valley. Whereas on the northern route a day trip to Bryce is feasible (and highly recommended) from Zion so you only need to spend half a day at Capitol Reef enroute.
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