On the road again! For such extend plans unusual amounts of vacation or free time are typically needed. Somewhat suggesting, that extended road trips naturally occur during life transitions of sorts. I gotta say, what better time!
With the world still learning how to adapt to the Covid pandemic back in the summer of 2020, my two friends had the free time to help drive me back to school from Illinois to Colorado.
We spent 14 glorious days on the road, hit 6 states, 6 national parks and drove over 3,600 miles. Here was our route and itinerary:
Day 1: Depart IL, camp Badlands
Day 2: Badlands & Mount Rushmore, Custer State Park
Day 3: Custer State Park
Day 4: Cody, Wyoming
Day 5-7: Yellowstone & Tetons
Day 8-10: Moab, Arches, Canyonlands
Day 10-11: Las Vegas or SW Utah
Day 12-13: Grand Canyon
Day 13-14: Co Sand Dunes, Co Springs, Denver
Disclaimer: For ANY SUMMER ROADTRIP I HIGHLY RECOMMEND YOU BOOK YOUR CAMPING SPOTS/NATIONAL PARK RESERVATIONS EARLY! Or just be comfortable sleeping in the car, booking last minute hotels or simply just winging it. Check out my lessons I learned on the road on how to make the most of life on the road.
Day 1: Depart IL, Camp in the Badlands
Get TF out of the Midwest as early as you can. Enough so that you can time out your drive to picnic at Sioux Falls for lunch. You’ll want the view after 300+ miles of nothing.
Keep on driving and come afternoon find a camping spot near Wall Drug.
For about 10 or so miles there are a bunch of pull off remote camping spots like this one. The coordinates are: 43.88997 N, 102.22700 W if you’re feeling like scout. To sum it up I’d say free site, breathtaking morning views, occasional high winds, frequent mountain goats and close enough to wall drug if you need to go to the bathroom or get food, aka an amazing campsite.
Day 2: Visit Badlands National Park & Mount Rushmore
Drive the Badlands National Park! Spend the day there following Buffalo (from the car of course), before continuing onto Mount Rushmore. Which I should note is free to enter and pretty close to your next campsite.
For the night, you can choose to camp in the Badlands or continue into Custer State Park. In my opinion, Custer has more to offer like water sports gear rentals, restaurants and amenities that makes for a more versatile camping spot.
Day 3 & 4: Custer State Park & Cody, WY Rodeo
Custer State Park has serious National Park potential, yet a mom & pop atmosphere that keeps it quaint and quiet.
Visit Sylvan Lake where Nicolas Cage found the entrance to the Book Of Secrets. Or at least where you can hike, kayak, paddle board, fish and more. I do recommend the hike around the lake though. It’s easy to moderate, great views and unique parts of the trail you’ll have to wait and see for yourself.
On your way out, I encourage you to book a cabin at the at the Cody KOA and visit the Cody Wyoming Rodeo. Though whatever you do, DO NOT TRY TO GO HOME WITH A COWBOY. Still apologizing for that night. Big thanks to Sydney & Jes for putting up with me!
Day 5-7: Yellowstone & Grand Tetons National Park
Just an hours drive away, you’ll enter the famous Yellowstone National Park and Grand Tetons National Park to follow. Definitely book your campsite in advance for both these places! Every time I have gone I of course haven’t and ended up scrambling for a place to stay.
Both parks take weeks to adequately explore but a day and a half at Yellowstone will give you plenty of time to view drive most of the park and see the rainbow pool, mud volancos, hot springs, geysers and do a hike or two.
Amazingly enough, Old Faithful erupts like clockwork. I advise you to time out your visitation because if you miss it, it’s potentially a 2 hour wait and there’s so much more of the park still to visit.
The Grand Tetons are better suited for hiking. Here stumble upon jaw dropping mountain top lakes for picnics or post hike dips. Additionally, you can hike or boat to the Hidden Falls behind Jenny Lake for more magical mists. Regardless, in both parks, be prepared for high volumes of traffic and people.
We of course did not book a campsite before entering Yellowstone and The Tetons and come nightfall all camp sites in the park were full. God bless the attendant at Colter Bay Campsite (fantastic camping spot by the way) for letting us and a few others without reservations share a group campsite. We still text the older couple we met from that group site to this day.
Day 8-10: Moab, Arches & Canyonlands National Park
Travel 8 hours South and you’ll hit your next set of National Parks. We ended up splitting up the trip down and stayed a night in Salt Lake City, Utah. I DO NOT recommend checking out the actual Salt Lake, not worth it, though the night life downtown is quite fun. From here, you’ll only have 3.5 hours to go tomorrow.
Conveniently all 3 of these places are within a 30 minute drive of one another. Mind you though, that Arches National Park is still requiring reservations to enter the park.
Arches National Park can be done pretty efficiently. An excess of arches are available from the road or a short hike from the parking lots at the bottom. There will be a lot of people, but still absolutely worth going.
On the other hand, Canyonlands is quite different than Arches. The park offers more limitless overlooks of canyon ridges, camping space, lengthy hikes and less crowds.
Once you’ve had your fill of National Parks, finish your day in the town of Moab. From here you can rent a dune buggy and off-road in the desert! Haven’t gotten to that one yet, but it’s on my list!
As for accommodations, there are a bunch of BLM (Bureau of Land Mass, not Black Lives Matter lol) camp sites along Highway 128 that sit right on the Colorado River. They are cheap, have bathrooms, fire pits, tables and direct river access. Literally what more could you need.
Day 10 & 11: Viva Las Vegas
We ended up driving 7 hours all the way to Vegas. Funny enough we actually used all of our time in Vegas not to rage, but to recover. Two days we spent at the New York, New York hotel thanks to My Vegas Slots for the 2 free nights. I’ll share how we got that and more in a future article.
We still had a great time in Vegas, however unless you’re dead set on going I’d instead visit Zion National Park & Bryce Canyon National Park. Either way you still need to get yourself to the Grand Canyon.
Day 12 & 13: Grand Canyon
Drive two hours Northeast and you’ll hit the Grand Canyon. Close off the main road, lookouts are available almost everywhere. Thus making for a stunning, yet crowded place to watch the sunset. Nonetheless, totally worth it. Furthermore, camping is available throughout most of the canyon. Though it’s only available to book 3 days in advance; Perfect for road trip plans. We stayed at the Ten X Campground on the South Rim and woke up to elk!
Even more, if you want a real inside look to being a park ranger at the Grand Canyon read Ranger Confidential by Andrea Lankford.
The trek from the Grand Canyon to the next stop, Great Sand Dunes of Colorado, is approximately 8 hours. It would be best to split up the trip and come up through Page to visit Horseshoe Bend or make some stops in South West Colorado if you have extra time.
I can’t remember our exact route we took to get to Great Sand Dunes National Park, but if you wish to extend your trip an extra day or two I’d take Highway 145 through Mesa Verde, Telluride, Ouray and The Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park.
Day 13 & 14: Great Sand Dunes, Colorado Springs & Denver
First of all, congrats you have made it to your final days. At this point you’re either ready for a hot shower and proper bed, sad it’s over already or maybe a little bit of both.
Other than the dunes there is not much to do. Thus, I would plan on hitting Colorado Springs before you make your way up to Denver. Here you can drive through the Garden of the Gods, hike the Manitou incline, ride up to Pikes Peak and salute the Air Force Academy.
Wherever you’re coming from, get to the Great Sand Dunes early! It gets hot! Also, without hesitation rent, borrow or make your own sand board. A few miles outside the park are rental companies, but plan ahead if possible to avoid long lines. Or find some big cardboard and some duct tape and DIY it!
If you have time before your flight out, absolutely check out Denver. I’m releasing a Denver City Guide here soon, but in short: crawl through Meow Wolf, tour some breweries, see a game at Mile High and of course dance the night away at a Red Rocks Concert. Or go just to say you’ve been! The amphitheater is open to the public from 5 a.m. to 11 p.m.
Before You Go
- Leave space in your schedule to adjust! Add some spontaneity!
- Sign up for gas rewards
- Use Split Wise or take pictures of receipts, but FIGURE OUT EXPENSES AT THE END OF THE TRIP, you’ll have plenty of time back at the office to track all of your nickels and dimes
Three people was an ideal number for driving, space and buddy entertainment. We had the greatest ups and 1 ultimate low (again, no cowboys), but this road trip bonded us for life. I am so grateful to have friends that love me enough to spend 14 days in a car on the open road together.
As a reminder, these are my genuine recommendations. Aka I am not getting paid to promote anything I’ve suggested. Thanks for reading and as always please add in the comments below your personal experiences, suggestions or insights!
2 responses to “Illinois To Colorado Ultimate Summer Road Trip Route and itinerary”
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Sounds like a great adventure! Thanks for sharing, brings back lots of memories!
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Love reading about all your adventures and tips!
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