Father/Son Trip

Hi all,

My son and I are planning a trip from home, Pennsylvania, to a few states out west. He graduated high school and will be going to college in the fall. Below, I will outline our rough plan and I’d like to get feedback and ideas from you all...the local experts.

• 26 June (Saturday) fly to San Diego. We’re staying at Coronado (I’m retired Air Force). We have tickets to a Padres game that night. There won’t be much time to do anything else this day.

• 27 June (Sunday) drive to Phoenix in the morning. No plans yet other than we’re staying on base at Luke AFB. Hiking, mountain biking?

• 28 June (Monday) drive to the Grand Canyon in the morning and sightsee. After that, we will drive to Page, Arizona and spend the night.

• 29 June (Tuesday) will be a busy/long day. We plan on driving toward Zion National Park to sightsee and then to Toquerville Falls. Once there, we are going to 4wd to the falls (we rented an Tacoma for the entire trip). I wanted to find an easy place to 4wd so we don’t do damage to the rental—we won’t be “sending it” or having any “hold my beer moments.” After all of that, we’re driving to Las Vegas to stay for a couple nights.

• 30 June (Wednesday) we are renting a C7 Corvette for the day and are limited at 200 miles. The plan is to just drive around, but we are not sure where just yet. Dam? Canyons?

• 1 July (Thursday) we will spend the day in Vegas where we hope to spend time on Lake Mead. I doubt the Tacoma will have towing capability, but if it does, we will rent jet skis from Nellis AFB. If not we will kayak, fish, swim and just dink around. We may spend an extra night in Vegas, but we’re not too sure yet.

• 2 July (Friday) we plan to visit Edwards AFB, CA where we lived and just explore the whole area. To sleep, we may just stay in Palmdale or maybe even somewhere a little more south to get us closer to the airport.

• 3 July (Saturday) fly out of San Diego.

Our general interests are: motocross, ATV, cars, trucks, hiking and doing crap outside. Please feel free to make suggestions on anything that we “shouldn’t miss.”

Thanks for reading.

John

 

Man, that’s a lot of time in the cab! As long as you’ve both been saving up conversations, should be a great time to catch up. I’m hoping the current heat wave lets up a bit, but if not, maybe consider forgoing the military accommodations set up for the 27th… too hot for outside activity unless it’s at day break… and instead take any lodging that gets you close to the Grand Canyon in time to arrive for sunrise on the 28th. I’ve been to Phoenix and the Grand Canyon and can say for sure, neither are fun when it’s hot.

 

This is going to be a memorable trip with your son. Please post up a trip report so we can enjoy the awesomeness with you guys.

 

Some of the rounds I will occasionally make when I’m in Vegas. Red rock is pretty cool, as well as Mount Charleston. you can do a little hiking at both. Numerous trails throughout. I tend to just take some short walks up a few of them. At red rock I even hiked to a waterfall which was pretty bad ass for a short hike. While in San Diego, try to look around a little bit, I always like that place. I want to say it’s called the gaslamp quarter. Some fun places to eat as well as good pub food. I think it’s pretty close to the padre stadium. I also really like old town San Diego. Lots of cool history. Haunted houses, small haunted cemetery. Great restaurant, very cool old charm. I always make sure to get some fresh homemade tortillas from the lady making them for public view in front of the Mexican restaurant.

It does sound like you are packing a lot into a short amount of time, too bad you couldn’t spend a few days at each of your stops.

Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area
(702) 515-5350
https://goo.gl/maps/rtAuDTrLRRsnKqYa9


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