Las Vegas Campervan Adventure: Legends of the Old West

For the first part of your Legends of the Old West Las Vegas campervan trip, we recommend heading southeast, toward Hoover Dam. Hoover Dam really isn’t that far away from Las Vegas — less than an hour’s drive. As such, start off your road trip with a morning visit, and maybe enjoy a guided tour of the dam and power plant, before you head on to the Grand Canyon. (It’s worth noting that, if you do want to take a tour at Hoover Dam, you can reserve power plant tour tickets ahead of time, online, but you can only purchase guided dam tour tickets on-site.)

Your drive from Hoover Dam to the Grand Canyon will take just under four hours. Depending on how long you stayed at Hoover Dam, you may have as much as half a day at the Grand Canyon, to explore, before you need to park up your campervan for the evening. Take a scenic drive, go for a hike or take a specialty tour, like a rafting excursion or a mule ride up and down the canyon.

Then, when you’re ready to call it a night, head to one of the nearby campgrounds. You’ll have several options, but note that these campgrounds can get busy, so it’s wise to make your reservations ahead of time.

Of course, we wouldn’t blame you if you stuck around the Grand Canyon for multiple days. There’s certainly plenty enough to see or do, to stay there for longer than just one night. However, once you are ready to hit the road again, take your campervan rental to the next legendary spot on our itinerary: Monument Valley.

To get there, you’ll drive just a short distance to the northeast, about 175 miles and just over three hours. If you leave the Grand Canyon in the morning, you should be able to make it there by about lunch time, so long as you don’t stop along the way (and there’s not too terribly much to see and do along the route between the Grand Canyon and Oljato-Monument Valley, Arizona, anyway, so this shouldn’t be an issue).

Once you’ve arrived at Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park, take your time traversing the 17-mile scenic loop drive, for plenty of photo ops and expansive views of the towering sandstone formations rising up against the sky.

Do note that peak season for the park is May to September, so if you travel there during this time, you may face some wait times as you get around the park. However, that just gives you more time to take in the views.

For a place to set up your campervan, look to nearby, highly rated RV parks, like Goulding’s Monument Valley RV Park or The View Campground.

After Monument Valley, this Las Vegas campervan rental itinerary takes you northward, for about two-and-a-half hours and about 150 miles, to Moab, Utah. However, while this drive is short, you might want to take the time to make a few detours and see the scenic spots that await just off the main road. Natural Bridges National Monument, with its three sandstone structures, is nearby. Canyonlands National Park is not far, either, with its favorited photo ops, like at the Buck Canyon Overlook.

If you’re an avid hiker, you might also want to check out the hiking trails located just before you get to Moab, such as those in and around Dead Horse Point State Park. Stop-worthy points of interest include Dead Horse Point, Marlboro Point and Long Canyon Road.

Once you’ve arrived in Moab, you’ll be well positioned to enjoy even more outdoor adventures, but if you’re ready to take off your hiking boats and stay out of the sun for a while, you do have other options. Beyond hiking, rock climbing, white water rafting and generally seeing the outdoor sites, fun things to do in Moab include visiting the fossils at the Museum of Moab, shopping and dining your way through downtown Moab, or checking out the live music scene.

When you’re ready to set up camp, you can do so at one of the campgrounds at one of the surrounding state or national parks, or you can choose to stay at an RV resort, like the highly rated Portal RV Resort in Moab, or the Sun Outdoors RV park near downtown Moab.

For the fourth stop in our Las Vegas campervan rental road trip itinerary, we’re headed to another relatively urban destination: Salt Lake City, Utah. Again, you won’t need to drive all too far to get there. You’ll be crisscrossing the state in a northwesterly direction, for just over 200 miles and nearly four hours.

Arches National Park is right along the route, so if you didn’t have time to see this landmark of the Old West while you were in Moab, make time to do so now. Other potential stopping off points to sightsee along the drive to Salt Lake City include Manti-La Sal National Forest, Starvation Reservoir, Diamond Fork Canyon and Flat Top Mountain. Park City is also very near to Salt Lake City, and is a can’t-miss if you’re dying to get out of the desert and into the mountains.

Once in Salt Lake City, there’s plenty to keep you occupied, no matter your interests. Temple Square and the Utah State Capitol are worth a quick look, but then set aside more time during your stay to explore the Natural History Museum of Utah, Utah’s Hogle Zoo, the Tracy Aviary & Botanical Gardens and the Red Butte Botanical Gardens.

The longest stretch of driving on this road trip comes at the very end, when we head south from Salt Lake City, back to Las Vegas. Don’t think you have to spend that six hours and 400-plus miles solely in the car, though, without any stopping.

Right before you leave Utah, there are two landmarks that you might consider visiting: Zion National Park and Beaver Dam Wash National Conservation Area. Then, you’ll cross over a small corner of Arizona before making your way into Nevada. There, before you get to Vegas, consider a visit to Valley of Fire State Park, where you can see the Fire Wave, a geological formation viewable with just a short, easy hike.

Once you’re back in Vegas, you have two options. You can return your Las Vegas campervan rental before either continuing your vacation in Sin City or heading back home, or you can keep your campervan around for a little while longer, using it as your base as you enjoy the sights and sounds of Vegas — but without the high prices of a hotel room on the Strip. Whichever option you choose, you’ll have just enjoyed an unforgettable trip to some of the absolute legends of the Old West.

It’s undoubtedly via a campervan rental. You can go at your own pace, see the sights you want to see, change your itinerary at the last minute and never need to worry about checking into a hotel. Everything you need is right there, contained within your campervan, so you can travel with an unprecedented level of freedom.

Ready to start planning your trip? Reserve your Las Vegas campervan rental now — or get a quick quote as you plan your perfect road trip.

Thinking you’ll take a campervan road trip out of Las Vegas, but not entirely sure you want to spend so much time at the above national landmarks? Don’t worry — you have options, like these favorite road trips that all start in Las Vegas.