route from salt lake city to redwood national forest

Scenic or direct? The route on the best roads is I-80 to 37, 37 to 101, and 101 North to the park. According to Google maps that is a little over 1000 miles. Google says the shortest route, 832 miles, is to hang a right at Winnemucca and go up 95 to 140, 140 to 5, 5 to 199, 199 to the park. I'd probably take the shortest route only because most of it is not on the freeway. This route will pass through some remote "middle of no where" land, so make sure you plan your stops. I don't think I've been on 140, but I've been on a lot of those Nevada back roads and there are usually plenty of spots to pull over and boon dock for the night.

The 2 variations above will give you a good choice. Definitely different. One variant to the freeway choice would be to take I-5 north near Sacramento and take Hwy 20 west to Hwy 101 a bit north at williams to miss some of the Bay Area congestion.

I assume that you are asking about routes to Redwood National Park in CA, there is no Redwood Natl Forest. Years ago some of what is now Redwood NP was created from portions of the Six Rivers Natl Forest which is headquartered in Eureka CA. Both of the routes suggested by msmith1199 above are good, we usually end up on I-5 and cut over to US 101 by using CA 20 at Clear Lake. There are many CG's in the park and also some great places in the adjoining CA SP's that comingle with the NP. Stop at the Samoa Cookhouse just west of Eureka for a reasonably priced family style meal and take in some of the old looging history of the North Coast!

We were discouraged to rv the redwood national park as it is hard to maneuver the roads with anything bigger than a small trailer.

Most people leave their trailer at the RV park and go through the park in their tow vehicle.

Posted By: gayles on 03/07/14 11:30am

We were discouraged to rv the redwood national park as it is hard to maneuver the roads with anything bigger than a small trailer.

You will have no problem maneuvering HWY 101. We do it a couple of times a year in a 40' DP towing a Ford Edge. There are a lot of truck/5'er combinations larger than yours who regularly travel this route. Just stay in one of the rv parks which can handle larger rigs (I recommend Ancient Redwoods RV park which is right on the Avenue of the Giants) and then tour the parks in your truck.

gayles wrote:
We were discouraged to rv the redwood national park as it is hard to maneuver the roads with anything bigger than a small trailer.

What did you decide, are you heading to the Redwoods? Please don't let the bad advice you got stop you from going. I have no idea why somebody felt the need to tell you something like that.

We traveled the section of 140 from Klamath Falls, OR to Winnemucca, NV back in July of last year. We would gladly take that route again, though it is, indeed, very remote. We did fill up on fuel in Klamath Falls. Not a particularly fast route, but some very scenic sections. Definitely not a freeway!