One of our major questions when traveling in the southern Utah area was whether we could take our RV on Scenic Route 12.  This is by far the easiest route between Bryce and Capitol Reef, and we knew from descriptions it was a gorgeous road with lots of amazing things to see.

 

We also heard conflicting reports from numerous sources on whether or not this road was big rig safe so we decided to take our own day trip on Monday to see for ourselves.  We knew the road was probably too long for a single day trip, so we decided to go to the halfway point from Bryce.  Later we traveled the other half from Torrey and on several other occasions were on the road going to another destination.  At the end of our stay we had driven every inch of that road going both ways.  I have combined all the pictures from these trips into one post in order to make a serious point.   I would never recommend taking a big RV on this road.  And here’s why.

Now you may be thinking, I have handled grades before and I’m careful so it’s not that bad, and I agree…except here is what was at the end of those grades.  None of them were straight down. Oh and the road during the Dixie National Forest section can get icy and on more than one occasion we experienced snow in April up there.

What is unfortunate is there are several parks and campgrounds along the route, and to be fair we did see numerous C Class and travel trailers on the road.  If you travel in one of these by all means, but proceed with caution.  On the other hand, we never saw fifth wheel, Class A, or semi truck, which again should tell you something.  It’s really unfortunate that there is no warning at the beginning of either section of the road.  I am not sure why, because we have been on less difficult roads that have had warnings.

Now that we got that out of the way, let me tell you about how amazing the road is. First of all, it starts at both ends at higher elevations, with pine trees and snow, and then drops down into the Grand Staircase Escalante, which has desert terrain.  The contrast is stunning, and we learned later from the Escalante Visitors center that the route passes through six elevation zones.

 

 

 

One of our favorite sections near Boulder is the Hogback.  This section has steep drop-offs of 1000 feet on each side and is absolutely gorgeous.  It’s difficult to capture in pictures, but Lee tried.

 

 

 

 

After Hogback you start to come down into Grand Staircase and the views go on for miles.  At the bottom is a campground called Calf Creek where we took a hike that I will talk about in another post.  It’s beautiful though as the rocks change from white to red as you go down.

 

 

 

It isn’t all rocks and vistas though.  There are several small towns to visit along the way and as I mentioned, three state parks.  We visited two of the three which I will cover in other posts, but they are all worth a look.  Really you can’t see it all in one day, which is why after Bryce we decided to stay over in Torrey for several days, although I am getting ahead of myself.  Let me just show you some of the other things we saw.

 

Many of the historical stops are run by the Mormon church and most of the small towns have a church as well.  Aside from them the only other church we saw was a small catholic church.   This might be the smallest Catholic Church we have ever seen in our travels.

In addition to the Mormon history, the entire area was home to Ancient Puebloans and there are hints of them everywhere if you look hard enough.

 

 

No matter which way you travel the road, I highly recommend a stop at the Visitors center.  They can give you the most up to date information on what is happening, in particular the state of the roads.  As you can see from the map at the beginning of the post there are lots of scenic byways off of 12.  Before traveling on any of them though, I absolutely recommend talking to a ranger, because you don’t know what the condition of the road may be.  We learned for example that all roads north of 12 were closed due to snow.  That wasn’t readily apparent from the road and we might have found ourselves stuck because many of the scenic roads can be very narrow with no room to turn around for miles.

 

 

 

 

Based on the road report and talking to the ranger, we did decide to try a short drive on nearby Cedar Wash road. At a much lower elevation it was clear and dry.  It’s a good thing we did talk to them because the signs really aren’t that great.  We started out going down Hole-in-The-Rock road and eventually hit Cedar Wash which circles around to Main Street.  It was fun getting off road a bit and because we were going so slow I could let Jack hang out the window which he liked.

 

 

 

 

 

We absolutely love the road, and highly recommend more than one day to travel it.  It is a great way to see Grand Staircase Escalante and there are enough different things to do that most people will find something they love.  It also has a remoteness and outwordly quality that we absolutely love.  This is highlighted by the UFO cloud we saw near the end of one of our days.  It was interesting, because we saw a similar one last year when we traveled on Cottonwood Road into Grand Staircase from the south.  At first glance this park seems barren, but like many other special places the more you look the more you see.

---

Supporting our Blog

We very much appreciate your support of our blog. You can help by doing any or all the following:

• Make purchases via our Amazon website links.  There is no additional cost to you, and a portion of the proceeds help support our blog.  Search Amazon.com here.
• Purchase the ebook telling the story of how we became full-time RVers.
• Purchase our recipe book filled with 80 recipes we have cooked in our RV and taste tested by Lee himself. You can purchase the kindle or paperback version on Amazon or buy the Apple version on Itunes.