On our cross country road trip we were able to see all 5 of Utah’s National Parks. If you don’t have the time to see all 5, but you are still looking to plan a visit to Utah, here are the National Parks I suggest you visit first to last!

1. Arches National Park

I am going to rank Arches National Park as the number 1 National Park in Utah mainly because of the hiking, the views, the size, and the location of the park! There is a reason why it is such a popular park, the views are amazing and there is a hike for everyone. Some of the hikes are super easy, or barely “hikes” at all, while others are a bit more challenging, but they all have amazing views of the different arches and the landscape is stunning.

The entire park is actually not too large, all the biggest attractions are very close to each other, which allowed us to hit all of our main want-to-sees in about a day. We did end up going back a second day though because we loved it so much!

Our favorite hike was the hike to Double O Arch, which included Landscape Arch on the way!

Another great part about Arches National Park is that it is located right outside of Moab, Utah, which is an awesome little town! There was great food and coffee, as well as lots of options of places to stay and visit.

Overall, You could spend a lot of time not only in Arches NP, but also in Moab and not run out of things to do or get bored!

2.Capitol Reef National Park

I’m ranking Capitol Reef National Park as number 2 because of 2 main things. The views/hiking and the animals! The hiking was awesome at Capitol Reef, and it was so incredibly beautiful and breathtaking to be at Sunset Point.

One of the best parts was all of the wildlife! We saw so many adorable deer prancing around as well as foxes and squirrels. There’s even bighorn sheep that were especially cute!

This park was probably the least crowded/busy which is ideal for us trying to enjoy hiking and nature, and being photographers and stopping and taking pictures every 10 minutes.

I would say the only bad part about this park is that it is in the middle of nowhere! It was a long drive to get to. Because it is such a large park we did not get to do everything that we wanted to do. If we were able to spend more time at Capitol Reef we would have been able to explore more than just the Fruita District because we really wanted to check out Cathedral Valley as well.

3.Bryce Canyon National Park

To be honest, we didn’t spend a lot of time at Bryce Canyon, but I still really liked it there. We weren’t able to do the hike that we wanted to because it was closed. So we drove around and saw the quick pull-off viewpoints and then visited Mossy Cave Trail which was a nice short hike with a waterfall. It is so nice to sit in the water on a super hot day like we had!

So even though we didn’t spend a lot of time at Bryce, the time we did spend was very enjoyable. If the trails had been open it would have made it better, but the views were amazing and it wasn’t over crowded at all. It was easy to drive around and was great for taking pictures.

4.Zion National Park

So, I have a feeling that this is an unpopular opinion, but the experience at Zion National Park is what I would call less than ideal. Adam put it a really good way saying it feels more like you are going to Disney World than to explore a National Park. What we mean by this is the entire shuttle system. I understand the benefits of the shuttle system, it just makes the entire experience feel much less adventurous.

The park also gets super crowded. It’s hard to find parking, and most people have to shuttle into the park from the town. We got lucky and found a parking spot after driving around the lot by the visitor’s center for a good 20 minutes waiting for someone to leave.

To have an easier time at the park, it would be better to visit when kids are still in school, but also when it's not too cold outside. We were unfortunately not able to hike the Narrows because of the high water levels in June (bad timing on our part), and lots of the hikes we were looking to do were closed because of rock slides. Even though those things are uncontrollable, they happen, and it is all for safety, it’s good to keep in mind what time of the year you are going and when these event typically happen.

The park is beautiful, the views are amazing, but we weren’t able to hike as much as we wanted to, and the crowdedness and shuttle system kind of put a damper on the situation. Therefore, Zion National Park kinda falls last to visit on my list simply because the experience I had doesn’t outweigh how beautiful it is.

5.Canyonlands National Park

I am going to rank Canyonlands National Park last-ish because of its location next to Arches National Park and Moab. Which, depending on how you look at it, is a good thing! There are many beautiful views in Canyonlands including Mesa Arch, the mountains, and the canyons, but there isn’t a whole lot going on in Canyonlands like there is in Arches. We expected to spend more time in Canyonlands and actually ended up leaving early.

If you are going to plan a trip, it would make more sense to plan it for Arches and Moab, and stop into Canyonlands for a day or half a day just to stop in and take in the views or for a hike!