How long does it take to drive from philadelphia to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon?
Hollywood asked:
My friend and I are planning a Grand Canyon road trip. We live about an hour from philly and have given ourselves 21 days to drive to the grand canyon hike it. and drive back. How long does it take to drive from Philadelphia to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon?
My friend and I are planning a Grand Canyon road trip. We live about an hour from philly and have given ourselves 21 days to drive to the grand canyon hike it. and drive back. How long does it take to drive from Philadelphia to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon?
You can do the drive in 3 days each way.
I dunno where you are but this is a ballpark 3 day westbound routing :
Pop this into mapquest or whatever
1)”Philly “to Ottawa IL
2) Ottawa Il >Ft Morgan CO
3) Ft Morgan >Moab UT>Kayenta AZ> Cameron AZ.
Spend the night at the Cameron Trading Post
Next day head into the Park and chat w /NPS -more on that later
Back to Philly in 3.5 days
Get out of the Canyon, take your showers and hit the road.
.5 ) GCN to ABQ
1.5 ABQ>Memphis TN
2.5) Memphis TN >Roanoke VA
3.5 )Home
That’s the easy part
The hard part is that hiking the Canyon is strictly on a permit basis and the permits are typically given out 4 months before a hike starts.
However there are also a walk -up permits issued by the back-country office located by the Maswick Lodge that begin the day after you get them. i.e.If you got one this morning it would be for a hike that starts tomorrow morning
Unfortunately campsite spaces in the areas designated Corridor and Threshold are usually all spoken for by now ,so if you’re a newbie Canyon hiker w/o a permit already in hand ,NPS will try to send you over to some of the areas designated as Primitive ….which isn’t the worst thing in the world
A really cool area to explore for week is the area between Hance Rapids and the Confluence of the Little Colorado River.
Park your car at Lipan Point and use Tanner Trail as your entry and exitting trail
On the uphill run [or if you get a late start on the downhill run] make a dry camp on the high saddle between escalante and cardenas buttes>doing so will allow you get out of the Canyon in daylight
If you have an EMS or an REI in your area,they should have the National Geographic /Trail Illustrated map of GCNP in stock
Buy it for planning purposes
ok, It’s 2345 miles, Plan on 4 day of serious driving, but not killing yourselfs to get it done. Thats 8 of your 21 leaving 13 for the Grand Canyon. Basic route would be PA t/p 76 W, to I 70 W, I55 S, I44 S t/p in OK, I 40 w to AZ follow the signs and be safe !!