Seeking alternatives to Grand Canyon due to shutdown

Go a little south of Flagstaff and tour Sedona/Cottonwood/Jerome/Prescot area - beautiful! We love Dead Horse Ranch State Park in Cottonwood...good for any size rig.

Some of the state parks in this area are a real find. If you can get on the state parks websites and find a lot of wonderful places to visit that you might overlook otherwise.

Eurocamper wrote:

darsben wrote:
Go to Canyon de Chelly northeast of Grand Canyon.

Canyon de Chelly National Monument is part of the National Park system and will likely be closed down too. The fact that there is no fee will probably not keep it open. The Park Service is instructed to close down anything that requires an operational budget, which de Chelly surely does.

I also suggest you look into some state parks.

There is no admission fee to drive around the canyon, The roads will be open as they are Navajo nation roads. The facilities (which are few will be closed). They will not close the roads. The CG is on Navajo land.

darsben wrote:
Go to Canyon de Chelly northeast of Grand Canyon.

Canyon de Chelly National Monument is part of the National Park system and will likely be closed down too. The fact that there is no fee will probably not keep it open. The Park Service is instructed to close down anything that requires an operational budget, which de Chelly surely does.

I also suggest you look into some state parks.

I would also opt for Valley of Fire State Park. Gorgeous!

Look into Utah State Parks.

Go to Canyon de Chelly northeast of Grand Canyon. Much prettier canyon. A lot of people think nicer than Grand Canyon (so do we). There are a couple of commercial CG outside the park. There is no entrance fee and so nothing should be affected except Facilities closed but the view will be great. The Navajos have a CG nearby $14.00 per night.

http://www.navajonationparks.org/htm/canyondechelly_camp.htm

Check with the Grand Canyon RR to see if they are running. If so, stay in Williams and take the train to the South Rim. Williams has some interesting Route 66 sights especially one old fashioned ice cream place.

Like Desert Captain says. Go to the North Rim and boondock outside the actual boundaries of the park. You can see the canyon, and avoid the actual park entrance.

While I sincerely doubt the park will be affected by the utter nonsense in Washinton I would.highly recommend going 45ish miles NE of Vegas to the Valley of Fire SP. We were there a couple of nights ago and it is gorgeous with nice amenities. From there go on up to Zion, try for an opening at the Watchman CG inside the park, they often have open sites at the last minute.

From there take 89A up to Jacob Lake which puts you 47 miles north of the North Rim CG. Watch the weather at the North Rim as it is over 9,000'. Aftrr the Notth Rim consider Monumemt Valley... It is AWESOME!