Family National Parks Road Trip

[adamis]

This summer with all of the virus mess we have found the silver lining in the cloud in that our summer for once is completely wide open. We have a 13 year old and 11 year old girl plus two twin identical newborns. Ordinarily our older girls would have a summer jam packed with activities making it nearly impossible to do any trips longer than a week. The virus however has changed all of that and so we are looking at taking this rare oppurtunity to do a long road trip around the Western US to visit as many of the National Parks we can. So far my proposed route looks like this. Note that Google Maps only allows for route planning with 10 stops.

Editing this proposed Route from my original post... The number to the left is the cronilogical night(s) we would stay at said location. My initial post had Yosemite and Death Valley but I wasn't considering them as stops more than just passing through since we are close to Yosemite and Death Valley is not a place worth visiting in the summer.

1 - June Lake
2 - Las Vegas
3,4, - North Rim Grand Canyon
5 - Grand Staircase
6 - Salt Lake City
7, 8 - Grand Tetons
9, 10, 11, Yellow Stone
12 Deer Lodge
13, 14 Glacier NP
15 Spokane
16 Woodinville
17 Queets WA
18 Astoria
19 coos bay
20 eureka, CA
21 Point Arena, CA
22 Gilroy

At the very early stages of planning, I am stuck with two approaches:

1. Stick with this loop that hits as many of the parks as possible and allot just one to two days to see and do everything at the parks.

2. Drop a few parks in order to increase the number of days we can stay at the remaining parks.

I know many of these parks to fully experience you need several days to do them justice and really explore each one. We only have maybe three weeks to work with however and because of the babies, most of the activities will be limited to what can be driven too (long hikes are out but we can probably handle hikes up to about 3 miles in length). It is very unlikely we will ever get the chance again to do a long road trip with our girls in the future so we have one shot at this experience.

So my questions for the community are:

1. Given these constraints, if you have visited these parks before, do you have any suggestions on which approach to take? IE, hit as many as possible or just focus on a few?

2. Out of these locations are there any MUST SEE destinations that are easily accessible via stroller or short hike (less than 3 miles) that need to be on the bucket list?

3. Camping Reservations we expect to be a challenege. Are there any great campsites / campgrounds either in or close to these parks that you know about that tend to be less busy?

4. We will be pulling our cargo trailer so our older girls will have their own space. Wife and I are debating on what "toys" to bring along. Bikes are always a pain so we are considering electric scooters because they are compact and easy. We have some blow up paddle boards but they only make sense if we might end up at a campground next to water that is decently warm. Any other suggestions on activities to bring for a trip like this?

[JimK-NY]

I am surprised teenagers would even go on such a trip with the 'rents.

[Kayteg1]

Nice to hear you are back. even such trip had expectable troubles.
Talking about teenagers - it is lost battle.
Years ago I took my sons for week long vacation to Paris.
What do they remember the most? ..... visit to McDonald ( who in Paris was more expensive than Black Angus in US)

[Grit_dog]

Nice recap!
Glad to hear you made it a successful trip. No matter what you do, you could always wish you did more or did something different. But it’s the experience that counts.
Re kids and devices, umm dude, we’re all the same. Bet the adults spent enough screen time too.
Perhaps you recall your youth, I do and I understand the way I was at 14 sittin in the car for hours on end staring at “scenery”. We just didn’t have as good of Electronic devices. Sure wore out some batteries though in a couple of “80s video games” back then.

[adamis]

Well we made it back safe and sound! Left on the 6th and just got back on the 31st. Route included:

Gilory, CA
Redding, CA
Goose Lake Recreation Area, OR
Mountain Home Walmart, ID
Grand Tetons Upper View Campground, WY
Yellowstone, MT
Glacier NP, MT
March AFB, WA
Kent, WA
Port Angeles, WA
Navy Pacific Beach Conference, WA
Astoria, OR
BlueBill Campground, OR
Cresent City, CA
Redwoods, CA

I will follow up with a more detailed trip report later when I have some time to fully map and digest. In short, I think the mileage was close to 3400 miles. I would say this trip was about 80% successful for what I had hoped. A few quick notes:

1. The mileage really did suck. For what we wanted to accomplish it was a necessary evil but if I had to do it again, I would cut the Oregon Coast out and make it it's own trip. I was visiting my manufacturing plant for this trip which is in WA hence why it was included to begin with. Yes, we could have bombed down the I5 over a couple of days but we also had friends on the coast we wanted to visit.

2. The twin babies did fantastic. The 7.3 just put them to sleep and they stayed asleep almost all of the drive.

3. Speaking of the 7.3, I lost a fuel injector going from Grand Tetons to Yellowstone. Unfortunetly ran the rest of the trip on 7 cylinders. It made it a challenge as I basically had only 2k to 3k rpm range. Anything below 2k had too much vibration and of course the engine redlines at just above 3k. I still managed the Homestake Pass into Butte, MT but it was a rough. I tried finding a shop to do the repair but everyone was 3 weeks out. Truck is headed to shop first thing this week.

4. Bigfoot Camper is fine for two adults but add in two teenagers, two babies and a dog it is a tight squeeze. The teenagers have a converted 12ft cargo trailer that has a queen bed and tv / nintendo and that helped a lot to keep them out of our space but they were often in the camper for food / bathroom or because it was too hot in the trailer in some locations. The biggest frustration was the narrow aisle our camper has (no slides). If it was just the wife and I plus babies, camper would be fine but reality is setting in that I think a trailer of some type is in our future. I love my camper but with our growing family, wife is adament that we need more space if we are going to go on extended (3 month) trips.

5. 100AH Battle Born LiFePo4 battery with 200w of solar was sufficient for our trip, even when running bottle warmers for babies (~300 watts) or a small coffee maker running on our 2000w inverter. We only had one morning where we ended up with a dead battery and I'm not certain exactly why that happened. I will likely add another 200w of solar to the camper and probably 600w of solar to the trailer (because I have the space, why not...) as future upgrades.

6. Our destinations we made it too where more like a drive by tour. Going in, we knew this was going to be the case simply because the babies where going to limit what we could do. We were often faced with the choice of waking up babies in order to go see a site or just let those in the front seats go see and get pictures.

7. We didn't get nearly enough relax time in camp. Every mileage day we had ended up taking twice as much time as I had planned. Whereas I thought a 200 mile day would have us getting to a campground by mid afternoon, we often didn't get in until 7 or 8pm. Much of this was because it's impossible to get two babies and two teenagers all coralled up and in the truck anytime before 10am.

8. Speaking of teenagers... I'm of the firm mind that electronic devices suck. Our older girls spent the vast majority of their time looking at what was 6" in front of their faces instead of the amazing beauty of God's creation out the window. For me, this is why I think the trip was only 80% successful. While I think the girls did intake at least some of what there was to see, I don't think they got the same experience we all got as kids staring out the window being bored and allowing our imagination to take over. You might be asking why not just take the things away? Well, it is complicated but suffice it to say, there were a few areas that I made sure they went away while others I just let it slide. It is a lot to ask of a teen to go 3400 miles in 3 weeks while just staring out the window.

9. RV parks are not campgrounds... This being our first extended road trip, it was the first time we used RV parks extensively. While I prefer public campgrounds, this being a last minute trip, we didn't have the ability to make reservations because everything was booked. A lot of public campgrounds aren't even open or their booking policy is multiple days out because of COVID. RV parks although not as ideal, where generally something you could still get reservations in. We used mostly KOAs because they are geared for familes with kids. They can be a mixed bag though. The KOA just outside of West Glacier is more of a park than a campground. It was amazing and we all agreed is worth returning too again. The KOA outside of Astoria is also really great for kids and worth returning to. The KOA in Kent Washington is a disaster. I literally locked the girls in the trailer at night just so I didn't have to worry about crazy long term resident 5 feet over. Other RV parks are a mixed bag but it seems like they are very much profit driven. One gem was the military family campgrounds. We stayed at two and both were nice and half the cost of RV parks.

There are other thoughts but this post is already too long. Suffice it to say, while I am glad we did this hurculean endevour, I think we will take some significant lessons learned from this trip to apply to future ones.

[Grit_dog]

If you haven't gotten on a waiting list for a cancellation for the NPs, do so immediately.
Greater chance of getting a site. No, there aren't overflow lots where you can camp like homeless hippies inside the NPs.
Either find private or public campgrounds outside the parks. Will require more driving.

[jimh406]

adamis wrote:
From that point, I have not worked out a route up to Glacier National Park but I suspect there will be at least one if not two stops along the way. Any good suggestions?

The issue we are going to have are finding camp sites in the National Parks that have sites available. It does appear that there is a large selection of first come first serve availability in Yellowstone so that helps but looks like you need to get there early as they fill up fast. What happens if you just cannot get a campsite at one of the campgrounds?

There are private parks closer to Missoula/Kalispbell as well as national forest nearby. Keep in mind that the area around Glacier and the area around Yellowstone and Tetons are Grizzly bear areas, so you have to be careful.

Private parks aren’t cheap around both of those. I would book reservations as soon as you can because they aren’t huge and they fill up pretty fast. There are also parks along I-90 from Yellowstone to Glacier that you could stay. Some have dry camping which would make it cheaper.

You’d need to leave Yellowstone to camp if you don’t have reservations. That being said, there are usually 1 day camping spots at the areas that you can reserve. Some of those have shower facilities as well. Sure, you may have to go to a different place each night, but possible. If I was you, I’d book a spot once they are taking reservations or stay outside the park. If you plan the route, it wouldn’t be horrible to camp outside the park. Stay near Jackson one day, West Yellowstone one day and stay near Gardiner a different one, for instance. If you need hookups every day, you might have to stay outside the park considering there is only one campground in Yellowstone that has hookups.

[ppine]

Ely is one of the coldest towns in the state. But Nevada is mostly just cactus and rocks.

[adamis]

Looks like I was confusing people as I had not updated my map I linked in my orignal post based off the changes I've made. Here is the updated map here.

Since Grand Canyon and Vegas are out, the idea is to cross the desert country with just one stop that would keep us in the heat. By shortening the route this way, it also gives us more time to shorten travel days on other parts of the trip.

So far the stops I'm thinking of include:
1. Lundy Lake Campground, CA
2. Iron Horse RV Park, Elko, NV
3. Cloverleaf Campground, ID
4. Signal Mountain Campground, Grand Teton
5. Yellowstone Campground TBD for availability

From that point, I have not worked out a route up to Glacier National Park but I suspect there will be at least one if not two stops along the way. Any good suggestions?

The issue we are going to have are finding camp sites in the National Parks that have sites available. It does appear that there is a large selection of first come first serve availability in Yellowstone so that helps but looks like you need to get there early as they fill up fast. What happens if you just cannot get a campsite at one of the campgrounds? Are there overflow lots that you can crash at or are you literally forced to drive hours till you get out of the park and can find some National Forest to boondock on?

[Kayteg1]

Right now my weather station shows 26 mph wind with 28 mph gust and 102F.
I can barely see casinos 6 miles away and walking outside is like sticking your head into cloth dryer.
So yes, sun is the issue.

[jimh406]

Kayteg1 wrote:
Looks like they will spend 2 nights in Nevada.
Sunscreen and desert winds don't work well neither.

Maybe so, but if the wind is blowing hard, the sun isn’t as big of an issue.

[Grit_dog]

^Take the dumb argument elsewhere.

[Kayteg1]

jimh425 wrote:

Kayteg1 wrote:
Trees in Nevada? You have never been here Jim?

I didn’t catch that they were only going to Nevada. Also, if there aren’t trees, that’s what the sunscreen fabric is for. 😉

Looks like they will spend 2 nights in Nevada.
Sunscreen and desert winds don't work well neither.

[jimh406]

Kayteg1 wrote:
Trees in Nevada? You have never been here Jim?

I didn’t catch that they were only going to Nevada. Also, if there aren’t trees, that’s what the sunscreen fabric is for. 😉

[Kayteg1]

Trees in Nevada? You have never been here Jim?
Ely is not going to be much colder than Las Vegas, while shortest route you plan is via Las Vegas.
Nevada just started opening the parks and casinos are due next week, so you have to keep the eye on news. We drove 93 a week ago and all parks there are still closed. So far all campgrounds are closed.
If Las Vegas is too hot for you - Mesquite used to have very nice RV park for good prices.
Still no matter how you go, this is not area where you can sleep without AC.
On positive side, we are getting colder weather in Vegas now. So far only 100F after 113F wave midweek.