Lodging in Bryce Canyon National Park

At first glance, lodging options at Bryce Canyon National Park might appear simple and straightforward, but a little exploration reveals charming bed-and-breakfast accommodations in the area as well as the more typical park lodgings.

Your lodging options range from the venerable Bryce Canyon Lodge within the park's boundaries, and more typical road-side motels just outside the park entrance to B&Bs that back up to the park's boundary and offer relative solitude from the crush of park visitors.

The Bryce Canyon Lodge, which dates to the early years of the National Park Service, is somewhat small for park lodges, with only a bit more than 100 rooms. And far and away the bulk of those are not actually in a "lodge," but rather clustered in cabins that surround the lodge and which are a short walk from the canyon rim.

As David and Kay Scott, the Traveler's lodging experts, noted during a 2011 tour of the park system to update their book, The Complete Guide to the National Park Lodges, "except for three suites and a studio in the historic main building, the lodge has 40 virtually identical cabins, plus two motel/lodge-type buildings with 70 identical guest rooms."

Furthermore, the Scotts added, "The Western Cabins could use a little work, but are still our favorite place to stay at Bryce. They are roomy, have a large covered porch, are convenient to the main lodge building, and offer the ambiance appropriate for a national park stay. Some of these log-beamed cabins have vaulted ceilings, which makes them even better. Perhaps best of all is the gas fireplace in each cabin."

Although the concessionaire classifies the remaining 70 rooms as “motel units,” the couple added, "we have always considered them nicer than might be inferred from that description, and feel they would be better described as 'lodge units.' They are large and offer two queen beds and a private balcony."

Where can you find the B&Bs? Just east of Bryce Canyon is the small town of Tropic. Here you'll find a small handful of B&Bs, including a wonderful bed-and-breakfast, the Stone Canyon Inn, which backs up to the park. The inn offers a variety of accommodations, from rooms in the main house to cabins and guests houses on the 80-acre property. If you're looking to escape the masses and would jump at the prospect of hiking into the park from the B&B's backyard, this is a great place to be.

If you head west of Bryce Canyon for about 30 miles you'll find a number of accommodations, ranging from motels to B&Bs, in Panguitch.

Right outside the front gate to the national park is Ruby's Inn, a sprawling complex that dates to the early 20th Century and which, despite the Best Western branding, has remained in the same family, the Syretts, all these years. This sprawling establishment has just about everything you could need -- hundreds of rooms, restaurant, grocery, liquor store, beauty salon, digital photo lab, gas station, auto repair shop, and gift shop.

Ruby's has two partners right across the street: the Bryce View Lodge and the Bryce Canyon Grand Hotel. As you might imagine from their names, the Bryce View Lodge is less expensive than the Bryce Canyon Grand Hotel. Where you stay depends on what you plan to do during your visit, and what sort of room you want to return to at day's end. Bryce View Lodge closes in mid-October until roughly April 1, but the Grand Hotel is open year-round.

Things slow down quite a bit in winter, though, leaving just Ruby's Inn for you to stay. But it's comfortable, and the rates are hard to beat when you realize where you're waking up at.