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National parks on a budget: Breaking it down

So, by now, hopefully you have read the previous article I published about what to know when visiting National parks. If you haven’t then I suggest you read it as it discusses all the basic information and a short form guide before visiting National parks (this summer or thereafter).

I am going to break it down for you on how to travel on a budget and teach you a tad about travel hacking and how I managed to travel for three weeks without spending a lofty amount of money on stays. 

Now keep in mind that this trip was not staying in luxurious hotels and fancy RV’s or pop ups yet I was quite okay with that as I booked this trip, very last minute and knowing how packed the National parks were going to be I had to take what I could get, literally and figuratively.

So, I started driving from Los Angeles directly to St. George Utah. The drive was about 5.5-6 hours to St. George.

With the travel points I had accumulated from my Chase Sapphire Preferred credit card I was able to have thousands of points to use (as a sign up bonus) to use on any hotels/motels throughout the world.

Many will tell you, this is not the best use of your points, but when you know you are not hopping a flight in the near future to anywhere overseas, then it is worth using some points on to stay, versus paying dollar for dollar.

I stayed in a Ramada inn in St. George and ended up having a nice large suite. It had a couch and a king size bed, as well a as fridge and microwave. Now each morning to save money I made breakfast in my room and mostly had fruits and snacks on the road for lunch. Now again this I was okay with as I saved my dollars for a lovely dinner as most of the time I would be driving around National parks in the day time.

Restaurants and places to eat are few and far between when you are road tripping through the United States National parks. So, again as I mentioned in my last published post, be prepared. 

After my night stay in St. George I headed the 50 minute trek early in the morning to Zion National park where I ensured I arrived by 7am. Why you ask? 

Everything I read in my networking groups said that it is best you arrive prior to the 7:00am time as the free parking lots fill up and you end up hiking a mile and paying for daily parking along side of the road on the way into the Zion parking lot.

I knew I would be exhausted after hiking Zion, so I went outside of my normal comfort zone and booked a campground to stay which was less than $50 for the night. It wasn’t my favorite place to be, but the convenience of being ten minutes outside the park and a long day worked out well for the evening. 

From there I went onto various places and used travel points for the next week. I stopped in Idaho Falls, Idaho, another campground in Yellowstone National Park, along with the Grand tetons.