Las Vegas to Grand Canyon Motorcycle Tour

Four nights from Las Vegas to the Grand Canyon and back, self-guided, seven hundred miles on a motorcycle with the bike included.

This is about as simple as a motorcycle holiday gets, and the price reflects it: a curated route, a bike, and no guide, group or schedule to keep to.

Seven hundred miles round trip across Nevada and Arizona covers a good deal of what the south-west does best. The run out of Las Vegas crosses the Mojave, then the Colorado at Hoover Dam or Lake Mead, and climbs onto the Colorado Plateau. Stretches of the old Route 66 survive between Kingman and Seligman, which is the longest continuous original alignment left anywhere, and the South Rim of the Grand Canyon is the destination: a mile deep, several miles across, and considerably more affecting in person than any photograph of it manages.

The motorcycle rental is bundled into the price; fuel, accommodation and insurance were not stated on the listing and need confirming with the host, which on a four-night trip is a material part of the cost. The full day-by-day detail has still to be added. Spring and autumn are the seasons, since the desert in July is brutal and the Grand Canyon’s South Rim sits at over 2,100 metres and gets snow in winter. Five days riding at your own pace with nothing booked but the bike is the cheapest entry to this part of the world in the whole database, and it suits a rider who would rather plan their own stops than be led. Anyone wanting hotels and support arranged should look at a guided alternative.