Where to fly and drive to Yellowstone?

I'm not sure if you have ever been that way, but I don't know that people appreciate how big Yellowstone is. According to the NPS, it's bigger than Rhode Island and Delaware combined. You could easily spend a week seeing all corners of the park depending on what you like to do.

Salt Lake would be the best destination for major cities. Denver is too far and there isn't much in Wyoming and to be honest the drive from Salt Lake is much prettier than East Wyoming in my opinion. I can't speak to Boise, but the area in Idaho around YNP is beautiful.

I might suggest flying into Jackson, WY airport. It borders Grand Teton National Park. A lot of people spend some time there and to be honest, unless I'm fishing, I prefer GTNP for general hiking and scenery. You could fly into Jackson, stay there, and spend some time driving GTNP. Then you could drive up north on the west side of the Yellowstone and stay in either West Yellowstone, MT or Gardiner, MT (Gardiner would be my choice). Bozeman or Helena aren't too far away from Gardiner if you want to add another stop. Then you could head down the east side of the park and camp somewhere, stay in the park, or head back down to Jackson. Just something to consider.

Have fun! My favorite area in the US.

Your close options are Bozeman, MT or Jackson, Wyoming. The next best are Boise, ID and Salt Lake City, UT.

If you would be interested at all in renting an RV I would highly recommend that. Yellowstone trips are a lot of time in the car. Its a huge park and you generally are going 35-45mph the entire way with a lot of stops.

I wouldn't really ever plan on staying in the same hotel for more than 2 nights to see yellowstone. Jackson hole is nice because you have GTNP and you can stay in the same place every night and hit most of the park fairly easily. Again an RV is better there as you can camp much closer to the action.

I just got back from Yellowstone for my 3rd time this time with kids 5 and 2.5 and I won't go back with kids without renting an RV and camping. Don't have to sleep in the RV every night by any means. But its just so much driving and there are way more camping spots closer to the action. Plus hotels are basically $250 for a motel 8 type of motel everywhere, including inside Yellowstone.

To see the main attractions of Yellowstone you really only need 2 full days in the park. You can easily spend way more time there, but the majority of your vacation on a week long trip is likely going to be outside of the actual park.

We did Yellowstone as part of a 4000 mile road trip with our 8 year old this summer. We flew into Salt Lake City and took an Uber to pick up a rental SUV at a non-airport location. That saved us a ton of money vs flying into other airports nearer to Yellowstone and renting from an airport location.

On the way to Yellowstone, we spent time in SLC, Lava Hot Springs (Idaho), Jackson Hole and Grand Tetons National Park.

Lava Hot Springs was an interesting little town — you tube right through the middle of town. Also in Idaho, this wildlife park was very well reviewed for kids, but it didn’t work out for us schedule wise.

We enjoyed Jackson Hole Mountain Resort — lots of summertime activities.

After a day in GTNP and a few days in Yellowstone, we headed out the East entrance toward Cody and traveled on from there.

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The only thing i would suggest is to either stay in the park or move around as far as lodging. The park is huge and you will do a lot of backtracking otherwise.

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we stayed in mammoth, canyon village and grant lodge, and managed to see most everything we wanted to see without a bunch of backtracking and/or wasted driving. staying inside the park is the only way i'd do that.

you'll want to hit the drive up sites EARLY in the morning, and go to the wildlife valleys late in the afternoon/evening. set aside some time for short hikes and also some down time for the kids. its was just me and my wife so we went hard, i saw many, many families trying to do too much with the kids and they looked miserable

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Drive to Jackson Hole and stay there. Don't go to Yellowstone

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Wut?

I agree with everyone about staying in the park. We have been 3 times and always stayed in the parks. It gives you such a head start each day and saves a lot of drive time. We have been the last two fourth of July weeks and had no trouble getting camp sites in the parks(GTNP and YNP) without reservations. They fill up but get there around 8 or 830 and your fine. Don't expect to get Jenny Lake spots, you have to win the camping lottery for that.

I have 8 and 9 yr old boys who were 6 and 7 when we first went. They enjoy camp fires and exploring the area around the site. GTNP has canoeing and SUP y'all can do, String Lake will be the shallowest therefore the warmest. You can take the shuttle boat across Jenny Lake and do the Hidden Falls Inspiration Point hikes, my kids loved the boat ride. There is also enough bison in the park to keep em interested. You can go over to Jackson Hole resort and ride the lift up top. Jackson is cool for an afternoon. I like Thai Me Up and Snake River Brewing.

Yellowstone has a few must dos. Both sides of the Canyon to see the Falls, Old Faithful, Grand Prismatic, Hayden Valley, Mammoth Hot Springs, Lamar Valley and if open just outside the park the drive up Bear Tooth Hwy is amazing. There is enough wildlife in Hayden and Lamar valleys to keep the kids mesmerized. The colors of the thermo pools are real cool and geysers spraying water will keep the kids interested. There are a few spots to swim in the park also.

I'm not sure how you can turn it into a loop. I would just drive up into Jackson then north into the parks and do the trip as an out and back. If you have time the drive east from the eastern entrance of GTNP is rarely traveled and awesome! Also the ride to Cody from YNP is amazing until you get to Cody.

We have a done a week each time and plan on going back for a week each fourth of July.

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I'm not sure if you have ever been that way, but I don't know that people appreciate how big Yellowstone is.

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I drove a 1000 miles over 6 days never leaving Yellowstone Park,and didn't get to all the places I wanted to see.

How much time are you planning to spend out there.

If you wanted, you could start in Rapid City, see Mt. Rushmore, then take I-90 west. You could hit Little Bighorn and then get to Billings, take US 212 and drive the Beartooth Highway to the park.

That is a longer drive, and would be a longer drive back, but would hit a few more things to see while you are out there.

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think renting an RV is cool but would it make getting around Yellowstone a little more difficult? I don't think I would want to rent a car and an RV.

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Not really at all. Tons of RVs there. Some places that are the smaller attractions you will have to park slightly further away like 200 yards is all. But you can do almost the whole park easily. Something like 95% of visitors don’t go more than 1/2 mile from the road in Yellowstone.

My father in law has a place in Jackson hole so I watched airfare extremely closely this past September. Flights into Jackson got down to $480 each and flights into SLC around $315. But flights to Jackson also get as high as $800 if you are not patient and SLC peaks around $550.

If you fly into SLC and rent an RV the price of your trip is basically the same as flying into Jackson or Bozeman and renting a mini van or SUV as far as car-airfare.

I’ve never RV’d Yellowstone but my father in law has. I’m just saying it’s a huge park and hotels are a long way from stuff. I want to RV it to take our time and spend a whole week in and around Yellowstone to fish and wildlife watch more.

I’d plan on blowing through the southern loop in a day or half a day, and spend most of your time up north. Gardiner, MT is a pretty cool small town with quite a bit to do.

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one other thing about kids and national parks in general...they can sign up for the junior ranger program at any visitor center, and the ranger will give them a book to fill out while they are there. at the end, they take the ranger pledge, and get a cool patch to wear

maybe sounds dumb, is actually extremely cool.
wife and i took the pledge ourselves

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Nice...my son would absolutely eat this up.