Road Tripping in the USA!

[Janesy B]

Big gamble, there is some proper junk in Hertz Luxury and unlike Alamo you don't get to select your own car from a lineup. If you are going One-Way you often have little choice as the others tend to ramp the price up but make sure you ask for something else if they try and palm you off with some of the crapper Luxury Cars (The Buick Enclave is a Vauxhall Insignia for goodness sake, Luxury?!).

The saving and convenience of pick up location makes it worth the gamble and going from premium to luxury gives me a bit more leverage if they palm me off with something rubbish. If I wasn't going one way I'd have gone with someone else but I spent an afternoon going through all the options and this came out cheapest by far. I'll see how I get on in march

Just thought I'd mention it in case someone was going with hertz and wanted to increase their chances of getting something not totally awful.

 

[Fr0dders]

anybody got any suggestions for where to stay in San Francisco ?

At the weekend its coming up at least £150 a night, with most places charging $45 a night parking on top !

 

[[TW]Fox]

anybody got any suggestions for where to stay in San Francisco ?

At the weekend its coming up at least £150 a night, with most places charging $45 a night parking on top !

I found this, so I stayed in Foster City, a modern town where there are loads of corporate head quarters (ie Sony of North America).

This means there are loads of nice hotels for the corporate market which are empty at the weekend and are therefore cheaper than the city centre ones. It is a 19 minute drive up the freeway into the centre of San Francisco. Parking in SF on-street is free on Sundays.

So we just day-tripped in.

 

[Howard]

No, wrong Buick, I meant the LaCrosse

Yep that's an Insignia alright!

 

[Fr0dders]

I found this, so I stayed in Foster City, a modern town where there are loads of corporate head quarters (ie Sony of North America).

This means there are loads of nice hotels for the corporate market which are empty at the weekend and are therefore cheaper than the city centre ones. It is a 19 minute drive up the freeway into the centre of San Francisco. Parking in SF on-street is free on Sundays.

So we just day-tripped in.

How easy is parking ?

I'd assumed it would be like London and horrendous.

 

[[TW]Fox]

It was dead easy, I just parked it by the side of the road about 2 blocks from Lombard Street.

 

[Fr0dders]

Cheers

will look outside San Fran then.

 

[Randell Floyd]

anybody got any suggestions for where to stay in San Francisco ?

At the weekend its coming up at least £150 a night, with most places charging $45 a night parking on top !

We stayed in SF for three nights as part of out honeymoon roadtrip, and decided on the Redwood Inn. Friends had stayed there before and the location plus free parking made it a no brainier for us. It's everything you expect from a Motel down to the bucket and an ice machine, but it was clean and comfy and at the time very cheap compared to the rest of SF.

If you do stay there, you must pop across the road and have food at the Korean restaurant, it was amazing!

http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Hotel_...ews-Redwood_Inn-San_Francisco_California.html

 

[Fr0dders]

It's already fully booked for the weekend we want in August

 

[Lethal`]

Foster City should be a safe bet, or possibly Redwood City (but I think it lacks much choice). Some areas along the 101 from SJC to SF are less favourable... e.g. East Palo Alto.

I just thought of another attraction... Skyline Blvd. It's a high elevation road in the mountains that's definitely worth a go if you enjoy driving. You could also swing down to Los Gatos and explore the town (and the few exotic car dealers).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_State_Route_35

 

[tlrBeta]

Looks like I arrive in San Fran, the night of last Sunday of June - Gay Pride day. I'll have to make sure I arrive late so I can actually get somewhere in the car

Decided to probably keep the car for 1 night, allows some driving around and doing that road photographed

 

[thedoc46]

One I like to recommend in that area is Sheraton, Palo Alto, on Betty Metzler memorial. Cos you've a 5min walk from University Dr, (which is like the high street of Palo Alto) and its very upscale and very happening. Who knows you may even bump into some Silicon Valley celebs !! It's normally around $120 per night in summer. You could do Foster City, but outside of eating a In-n-Out burger, there's not going to be too much going on, and you'll need to get behind the wheel, and therefore miss out on beer !!! A much needed addition to a vacation.

Failing that, if you're looking for clean comfort the Hilton Garden Inns are always going to be nice... Around the buck 50 mark. Normally free parking with those. But once again, everything will be needing the car to go out.

 

[semi-pro waster]

Looks like I arrive in San Fran, the night of last Sunday of June - Gay Pride day. I'll have to make sure I arrive late so I can actually get somewhere in the car

It's horrendously busy on that day but it's also lots of fun if you can wander about and aren't easily shocked.

Who knows you may even bump into some Silicon Valley celebs !!

Oddly enough lots of people present themselves as Silicon Valley celebs or maybe that was just the pubs I was in, everyone had the idea that was going to make them rich and famous but yet none of them stood out as any different to the rest. Maybe I'm being unfair though as honestly I've got no idea what they had or hadn't done, it was just that pretty much all they could talk about was what they hoped/believed they were going to do but with no suggestion it was a realistic proposition.

 

[Lethal`]

One I like to recommend in that area is Sheraton, Palo Alto, on Betty Metzler memorial. Cos you've a 5min walk from University Dr, (which is like the high street of Palo Alto) and its very upscale and very happening. Who knows you may even bump into some Silicon Valley celebs !! It's normally around $120 per night in summer. You could do Foster City, but outside of eating a In-n-Out burger, there's not going to be too much going on, and you'll need to get behind the wheel, and therefore miss out on beer !!! A much needed addition to a vacation.

Failing that, if you're looking for clean comfort the Hilton Garden Inns are always going to be nice... Around the buck 50 mark. Normally free parking with those. But once again, everything will be needing the car to go out.

Do you live in the Bay Area?

 

[commited]

I’ve posted in this thread before, but I’ve just re-read it and taken in a lot more detail and it’s an absolutely great mine of information!
Our previous plan was to drive across the states which won’t work with the time that we have available now and the things we want to see. We’ve decided that a west coast trip will suit much better and I’m hoping to get a bit of a sanity check here on our route. I think it might be too much in the time frame. We’re not averse to massive drives, having done about 2900 miles in the space of just over 2 weeks while travelling Australia but this was with far less to see.

We will have friends who will be in Tahoe early May by co-incidence so we’d like to spend a bit of time with them and it’s a bit of a constraint on our schedule, meaning that we’ll have to hit San Fran during the week but that’s unavoidable. On the up side, £26/day for a convertible from Alamo seems decent - anyone any idea if they’ll still have Mustangs in stock then from SFO? Also, is there a best time of day to pick up the car, was planning on evening but is that a big mistake? I don’t really want to get lumped with a Chrysler 200 but I definitely want a convertible!

Plan:
6/5: arrive SFO morning. Stay Redwood Inn
7/5: Alcatraz. Stay Redwood Inn
8/5: Collect car in evening, drive to Sacramento via Olema– 140mi
9/5: Sacramento – Tahoe via Donner & Reno – 180mi
10/5: Tahoe
11/5: Tahoe-Yosemite Hodgen meadow camp – 230mi
12/5: Yosemite – Stony Creek via Bridalvel fall, glacier point – 200mi
13/5 Stony creek – Ridgecrest via General Sherman & lake Isabella – 230mi
14/5: Ridgecrest- Vegas via death valley, Badwater Basin, Red Rock Canyon drive – 325mi
15/5: Vegas
16/5: Vegas – Zion camp via Hoover Dam & Moapa Valley – 230mi
17/5: Zion camp – Kanab via Bryce: - 160mi
18/5: Kanab – Grand Canyon camp - 210mi
19/5: Grand Canyon – Needles via Havasu Falls – 250mi
20/5: Needles – Joshua Tree Nat Park camp – 160mi
21/5: Joshua Tree – San Diego via Palm Springs – 160mi
22/5: San Diego (probably stay Gaslamp District)
23/5: San Diego Zoo
24/5: San Diego – Laguna beach – 75mi (in evening)
25/5: Los Angeles day, stay Santa Monica – 100mi
26/5: Santa Monica to Pismo Beach via Santa Barbara – 170mi
27/5: Pismo – Monterey via Hearst Castle, Big Sur & 17mile drive – 150mi
28/5: Monterey – San Fran via Laguna Seca – 150mi
29/5: Drop back car at airport, fly to JFK
30/5-2/6: NYC

All in all, it will be 3000 miles + local mileage seeing bits and pieces. For worst case scenario, I’ve assumed that the Tioga Pass is closed. If Tioga Pass isn’t closed, this will buy us another day in Vegas or Yosemite. Apparently the snowpack is 25% of normal at the moment up in Lake Tahoe and Yosemite is “surprisingly” snow free so I hold some hope that it may be open.

Tioga Pass: Jan 13, 2014:

Any tips/advice? Have I missed anything obvious?

 

[tlrBeta]

May 15th and 16th sounds like a busy 2 days, 1 day and 1 night in Vegas enough for you?

Well 1 night really as you have come from Death Valley and your driving to Grand Canyon the next day - 5 hours drive, not exactly going to be a late one.

 

[Lethal`]

Ah wow. There isn't much snow at all

Don't worry about Tahoe being a bit of a 'constraint'. It's an awesome place, I visited 5 times in the last year. Plenty to do.

Is Sacramento just a stop on the way to Tahoe? There isn't much to do there

My only other slight worry would be that you're doing PCH the wrong way - you'll have to pull across traffic for views, but that shouldn't be too much of an issue.

There were plenty of Mustangs (in fact that was all I could see) at National/Alamo at SFO at the end of July. If you happen to get a 200, just go along to another airport later in the trip and swap it. Perhaps even try SJC, which is about 40 miles down the road...

Are you a hiker/looking for walks? I can probably recommend a few in Yosemite/Zion.

 

[tlrBeta]

Just on that Mustang note, anyone had experience using Dollar Rental? Seem to be the only one not wanting to charge one way fees on that PCH route. I'm sure it has been asked already

They seem to be the only one not charging one-way fees for a convertible in July :/

Edit** The original idea was for the following:

LAS > SFO - 25/06/14 - 30/06/14 £200
SFO > LAX - 03/07/14 - 09/07/14 £250ish + $350(+tax dropoff)

It seems if I just rent a Mustang all the way though, it works out £400 without any one way fees! Something to do with Rentals in July and August for Convertibles send it through the roof with one-way fees applicable.

 

[commited]

May 15th and 16th sounds like a busy 2 days, 1 day and 1 night in Vegas enough for you?

Well 1 night really as you have come from Death Valley and your driving to Grand Canyon the next day - 5 hours drive, not exactly going to be a late one.

Well it's looking like 1 full day, a morning and an evening. We're not heading out for GC the day after we do death valley, there is a day in between - ideally Tioga will be open and we'll get a second full day there. We could gain an extra day as well by going from Monterey to the airport on the same day and using that saved day in Vegas. If it's worth it, then we'll certainly entertain it!

Ah wow. There isn't much snow at all

Don't worry about Tahoe being a bit of a 'constraint'. It's an awesome place, I visited 5 times in the last year. Plenty to do.

Is Sacramento just a stop on the way to Tahoe? There isn't much to do there

My only other slight worry would be that you're doing PCH the wrong way - you'll have to pull across traffic for views, but that shouldn't be too much of an issue.

There were plenty of Mustangs (in fact that was all I could see) at National/Alamo at SFO at the end of July. If you happen to get a 200, just go along to another airport later in the trip and swap it. Perhaps even try SJC, which is about 40 miles down the road...

Are you a hiker/looking for walks? I can probably recommend a few in Yosemite/Zion.

I suppose what I meant by a "constraint" is that it limits our dates i.e. we have to start there! It also pretty much means doing the PCH the "wrong way" unless we double back on ourselves which doesn't really seem to make a lot of sense either.

Sacremento is just a place to stay, I might even pick one of the cheap motels in the towns either side!

You say I can just swap, do I just call ahead and ask if they have a Mustang in their lot and if they do, I just rock up and say "I want that one"? If so, that's fantastic!

We're not massive hikers, but will certainly walk a short distance to see something spectacular. When we travelled around Aus, most of the stuff was visible within a 30min walk from the car!

 

[commited]

Edit** The original idea was for the following:

LAS > SFO - 25/06/14 - 30/06/14 £200
SFO > LAX - 03/07/14 - 09/07/14 £250ish + $350(+tax dropoff)

It seems if I just rent a Mustang all the way though, it works out £400 without any one way fees! Something to do with Rentals in July and August for Convertibles send it through the roof with one-way fees applicable.

I just ran the dates and rentalcars came back with £379 all in for 25/06-09/07 with a mustang through Alamo, pretty decent deal!

Regarding Dollar - I believe they also let you choose your car. I'll probably be renting something cheap and nasty off them for a week in NYC (still trying to work out the route!)