Dinosaur trip with 2 young children
 

My husband and I and 2 children, age 21 months and 4 years, are planning a trip in early June to Utah to see all the dinosaur attractions. This is my current itinerary, please let me know if I am out of my mind or if this is reasonable.

Day 1: Arrive SLC in mid morning, drive to Ogden to Eccles Dino Park. May also try to go to Antelope Island if time permits. Stay over ogden
Day 2: Drive to Vernal. See petroglyphs and Utah Field House, stay over Vernal
Day 3: Dinosaur National Monument and Quarry, drive to Moab and stay over
Day 4: Canyonlands NP and Dead Horse Point State Park, stay over Moab
Day 5: Arches NP and Mill Canyon Dino Trail, drive to Wellington or Price
Day 6: Cleveland Lloyd Quarry, drive to Lehi or Provo
Day 7: Thanksgiving Point, Lehi
Stay over Lehi
Day 8: SLC and Antelope Island (if don't see while up in Ogden)
Stay over near SLC airport
Day 9: Depart SLC 630 AM

Any advice would be very helpful, as well as any recommendations for places to stay.

I think you would be ahead of the game to see if the children could not stay with one of the sets of grandparents.

Don't think you will find very many dinosaur fossils in Arches or in Canyonlands.

Have you considered making a stop in Fruita, CO on your way from Vernal to Moab? Fruita has a dino museum and a small dino hill (a dino skeleton was excavated there). From the map, it looks like it would be right on your way. You should make it a point to drive Hwy 128 to Moab, rather than 191. It's much more scenic, so do it in the daylight.

I don't know if you're a hardcore dino enthusiast or just doing this trip as something different. There are some dino track sites in the Moab area that you don't have listed. Are you going to Arches/Canyonlands for dino reasons, or just to sightsee? For me, this trip sounds too heavy on dino stuff and not enough other things, but if that's your thing, then go ahead and do it. It just seems like you're overloading a bit and might get tired of it by the end. If you're going to do some hiking or other sightseeing on the way, then you should be OK.

I think this is too much of one thing for the younger child. The four year old will probably get a kick out of it but I think the 21 month old will be trouble. Can you wait a couple of years until both kids can get a lot out of it?

Go here: http://climb-utah.com/

If you select Family Fun from the Select Category menu on the right side of the screen, you'll find a number of easy things to do. There are several things in the Moab area (dino tracks, ghost town) as well as around the state.

You're trip is a lot like the ones we use to do when our two boys were that age. It's a lot of work, but our trips were always well worth the effort and our boys always looked forward to our trips as the got older.

If you're doing it because your children like dinosuars, you might be over doing it, but if you are going because it's what you like then I'd say go!

I haven't been to all the places you plan so it's hard to tell if you will have enough time. I do know that Arches really deserves more than an hour or two. Even in June, this area can get HOT so outside activities might be harder to do. Carry plenty of water in your vehicle. Make sure you don't drive on dirt roads if it looks like rain or is raining. Flash floods happen in an INSTANT in these areas!

I've seen the dinosaur track that's out on the Potash Road (Hwy 279) out of Moab. It's a scenic drive with several petroglphys.

Here's a link: http://www.ugs.state.ut.us/utahgeo/d...dinotracks.htm

Utahtea