White Rim Road Travel Tips

Here are my tips if you decide to do the White Rim Road in Canyonlands National Park, Utah. A stock 4x4 will handle this road easily, but I wouldn't want to try it in a a dually truck. Many of the switchbacks are tight, and a longer wheelbase truck would require many multipoint turns. A dually is simply too wide. A truck with a small, well-attached pop-up slide-in camper could probably make the trip, but I think the best bet would be a truck with a topper or a truck and a tent. Make sure you have light truck (LT) tires with the appropriate load rating and air them down. Passenger (P) rated tires are not suitable for this road and most likely will be destroyed.

If you have off road driving experience and there is no rain or snow, you'll find the steep climbs, tight switchbacks and narrow roads challenging but passable. If you've never been off road with your truck, this is NOT a good road to start with. The trip will take at least two days, but next time I will go slower and explore more. There are many opportunities for photography. Unlike many places where the best light for photography is around sunset and sunrise, the best light in Canyonlands in May was between 8:30 am and 10:00 am. In the late morning there was good color in the rocks, the shadows weren't too dark and the sky was bright blue. A polarizing filter really helps bring out the color of the rocks and sky.

Permits are required both to drive the White Rim Road and to camp in the backcountry, and you should make your reservations early. Top off your fuel tanks. I only got about 7 mpg with all of the 4wd low range driving, and the loop is over 100 miles with a couple of opportunities for side trips. There is always the possibility of a road closure that would necessitate backtracking, and this is not the place to run out of fuel. Both my main fuel tank and my auxiliary fuel tank gauges were totally inaccurate and gave unreliable readings after my truck had been driven off road for a couple of hours. They returned to normal after a couple of fill-ups and some on pavement driving, but off road they simply didn't work.