After two days at Bryce, we are planning on visiting Canyon de Chelly. How long a drive will that be? Also, is it realistic to plan a day visit to Monument Valley on the way ?

From Bryce to Canyon de Chelly it's 360 miles and will take about 8 hours of driving time. This route is based on staying on paved roads. Some route makers will tell you to take Cottonwood Road BUT BEWARE this is a dirt road and might actually take you longer to drive.

I would at least drive up to Monument Valley. It's only a total of 22 miles and one hour out of your way. You can see a lot from the highway and you can take your presonal vehicle into part of the park.

Utahtea

I would like to throw in a few other observations here as well about Navajo Country. The drive from Bryce across southeastern Utah is quite scenic as well. You may not find any named places, but that does not detract from the landscape.

On the way, you will pass close to two features that always impressed me more than Monument Valley: Natural Bridges National Monument and the Goosenecks of the San Juan (River) State Park.

We last visited Natural Bridges quite a few years ago, and I was young enough to run up and down the ledges and ladders and go all the way to the bottom. We were able to look up at the underside of the bridges and see the differences between a bridge and an arch.

The Goosenecks are one of the most visible and most dramatic examples I have ever seen of entrenched meanders.
They certainly give vivid testimony to the fact that the Colorado Plateau was uplifed several thousand feet relatively rapidly geographically speaking and all the streams became rejuvinated and started cutting into the strata with renewed vigor.

Another aspect of Canyon de Chelly is that you tour the floor of the canyon on a schedule set by the Navajo. They control when tours depart and how many people go on each tour. We arrived there mid afternoon too late for another tour that day. Nothing to do but cool it until the following morning by driving to the various overlooks.


If you want to take your vehicle it must be 4-wheel drive, and you must have a Navajo Guide.

To take a truck type tour with about 12 people, the cost is $45 cash; extra if you charge it on Visa. A Navajo Business tax is also added. (You are in Navajo country here; they set the laws.)
The time required is about 3 hours.

Two departures: 9 am and 1 PM.
You might want to call the monument itself for more exact detail.

Thanks so much for your detailed input. At this point, I have a room booked at the San Juan Inn in Mexico Hat so we can enjoy Monument Valley before going on to Canyon de Chelly.

FYI - It will take you about an 1 1/2 todrive from MV to CdC ... roads are good.

Last summer we stayed at a B&B outside Mexican Hat at the Valley of Gods. Valley of the Gods is well worth the drive through. The B&B is Valley of the Gods Bed & Breakfast. It is just past the meanders mentioned in the other post. We only spent a few hours at Monument Valley last year and have regretted it. We are going back this summer for 2 nights. There are a lot of petroglyphs in the Mexican Hat/Bluff area also.

My main advice is not to overrate Monument Valley. I have driven through it in both directions more than once and have yet to do much more than marvel at sandstone buttes that cling precariously to a rapidly eroding landscape, rapid in this sense is geologically speaking.

There is a lot out there to see, and Monument Vally is one of several top level attractions.