Arizona & Utah.

Arizona 

• When planning a trip to Arizona and Utah, one is spoiled for choice with regards to National Parks and places to include as a stop on your itinerary. As we had been to the Grand Canyon before, we skipped this destination even though it could have easily been added in. We wanted to prioritize Sedona, hike a slot canyon, and visit either Zion National Park, Bryce Canyon, or both.

• To get to Sedona, which is a 2 hour drive from Phoenix, we flew direct from Boston to Phoenix and as we were traveling with young children we opted to stay one night in Tempe to minimize the travel fatigue. We rented a jeep at the aiport and were ready to set out the next morning for Sedona.

• For our stay in Sedona we elected to stay at an AirBNB for the ease of being with young children and having a kitchen and backyard. I would love to go back and stay at a resort, but we ended up loving our AirBNB for its spaciousness, yard, and location. It was nestled on a hill in the most picturesque neighborhood with red rock views, the house was beautifully decorated with a charming backyard with a fire pit and hot tub. The neighborhood was lovely for evening walks and our favorite hike of the entire trip, the Sugarloaf Loop Trail, was a short walk from our door. Here is the link to the home: James & Monica’s House - the host even helped us by letting us ships some Easter basket items in advance of the trip as we were staying over the Easter holiday!

• We stayed 3 nights in Sedona and were wishing that we had more time! The overall beauty, vibe, and focus on new age and wellness really appealed to us.

• A couple of places we really enjoyed-

  • Local Juicery for post-hike coffee and acai bowls and smoothies.

  • Tlaquepaque Arts & Shopping Village

  • Mariposa Latin Grill - pricy and fancy splurge dinner with beautiful views

  • Red Rock State Park

Utah

• From Sedona we were to head north to Utah, with our first stop being a guided slot canyon tour of a part of Antelope Canyon in Page, Arizona. While Lower and Upper Antelope Canyon are the most popular, there are many others as this sand canyon meanders from north to south. The slot canyons in this area are located on Native American land, and can only be visited with an advanced reservation and via a guided tour. Some even require permits, so be sure to do your research and book in advance. In fact, the Upper and Lower Canyons were fully booked months in advance for our dates, so we booked our tour of Canyon X with Taadidiin Tours. You must be respectful and follow their rules for arrival and conduct while visiting the canyon. Our tour took about 1.5 hours and we did it on our drive from Sedona up to our one-night stopover stay in Big Water, Utah. The experience was worth it, and one of the highlights of our trip.

• Please note! The drive up from Sedona on Route 89 ended up being a bit stressful, as our only road out had a bad accident in the canyon and we were delayed an hour just sitting waiting for it to be cleared. Since we had a timed entry ticket to the slot canyon we were stressed, but we made it just in time with minutes to spare! So note to prepare for anything on these canyon roads and allow for extra time.

• To break up our drive from Sedona to Kanab (Zion and Bryce Canyon area) we elected to stay one night at Under Canvas Lake Powell - Grand Staircase, which is a glamping tent experience. At the time we thought it was a little crazy paying what we did for a night in a tent, but were curious enough to give it a try. We absolutely loved it, and although it is a bit of a splurge, it was our kids’ favorite stay of the trip and I think it was worth it. The tents were beautiful with running water and all of the comforts of home, the dinner and breakfast in the amenity tent was fantastic (and the wine!), and there were communal fire pits for roasting marshmallows at night where we met other families and could star gaze out over the beautiful expanse of red desert surrounding us. They even had evening activities. We left saying that we would definitely stay at an Under Canvas again.

• Kanab, Utah - we chose to again rent an AirBNB in this cool town midway between Zion National Park (40-60 mins) and Bryce Canyon (1 hr 20 mins) as our home base. We stayed at Timber + Tin which was modern and had a great pool and game room barn that the kids loved. One of my treasured memories from this trip was going to Jake Leigh’s coffee shop each morning for yummy bagels and coffee and playing Uno with the kids. We also loved Iron Horse Restaurant and Don Beto’s Mexican.

• The owners of our AirBNB also own Expedition Kanab off-road UTV experience tours Kanab. We elected to do their Great Chamber Loop tour (4 hours) which took us to Peekaboo Slot Canyon, sandboarding and The Great Chamber Arch. I will say that it was a long time with the kids, and they took a bit getting used to riding in the off-road vehicle (which is rough and fast) but everywhere we went was very cool, and it was well organized and we saw so much! Note, wear clothes that you wouldn’t mind getting filthy- we were covered in dust and dirt afterwards!

• We also spent two days driving to and exploring Zion National Park. We opted to skip Bryce canyon as the drive was further and with the kids it seemed a bit exhausting. Perhaps staying within Zion would have been easier to avoid the long drive into Zion, but we enjoyed having Kanab as a home base.

• From here we were flying out of Las Vegas with a direct flight home to Boston, to avoid having to drive the roundtrip back to Phoenix. We stayed one night at the Mirage Hotel on the Vegas strip, which was a really odd place to be with young children and I wouldn’t recommend it! But it was a means to an end and we were only there for a short while.