Road Tripping in the USA!

Can I get some advice on travelling from Vegas to Yosemite in April, we are staying at Tenaya Lodge in Yosemite and I know that the Tioga pass is likely to be closed

My options are to go around the south side, I understand that this will be a fairly un-interesting drive though?

Or I can head north which I would hope to be more scenic and interesting but will I have to go all the way up to Tahoe to cut across? I'll also need a stop over somewhere if I go north as it is about 12 hours driving in total I think
 
AndyH_Lufc said:
Thanks Fox, we are seeing £488 at the moment direct with BA - London Heathrow to LAX. I thought this seemed quite good :)
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That's a great price! If you book that check if they have two flights back from LAX on the day of return. When I came back there was one around 4pm and another at 8pm. The 8pm flight was nearly empty meaning I had 4 seats to myself and more pillows than I knew what to do with. This is quite common from what I've been told.
 
[TW]Fox;27060396 said:
Just after Xmas is where I would expect to get the best deal on flights to LAX. Anything under £500 direct is a 'good deal' for that route.
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Quoting £330 return at the mo for Jan and Feb, but extra for luggage. LOL
 
Django x2 said:
Quoting £330 return at the mo for Jan and Feb, but extra for luggage. LOL
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Is this with Norwegian? They are who I flew with and do charge extra for things like luggage.

Even with luggage, meals, seats with extra legroom my flights came in miles cheaper than anybody else and the service was very good (9/10).

AndyH_Lufc - I'd book those LAX flights if I was you for under £500.
 
Thanks for input guys, looks like I'll get them booked soon!

I did look at Norwegian as I saw the cheap Jan/Feb flights, but they seemed more expensive for the dates we're looking at (1st 2 weeks of June) and they charge for everything as extras. Heard the 787 dreamliner is meant to be good though :)

Interestingly, BAs flights seem cheaper on Sundays and Wednesdays too, the price I found was for inbound and outbound on a Sunday.
 
Good luck finding a rental company who won't palm you off with the worst car they can find for a one-way of that length :p

They'll know they will never, ever see it again and you might find they take advantage of that.

I still think you will end up missing out on things by insisting on doing these huge coast-to-coast runs in limited time periods (A month). By not focusing on key areas you end up swapping seeing great things for just.. driving to the next place. For example with a month if you were to do a loop from LA to LA you'd be able to cover a route like this:

LA > Yosemite > SF > Seattle > Glacier National Park, Montana > Yosemite > Utah > Colorado > New Mexico > Arizona > LA

You'd probably end up seeing a load more and saving a bundle on your rental car, too.

Then the year after you could fly into DC and do the other half you didn't do this time, again, with more time to spend actually seeing stuff rather than driving from one side to the other. Your planned route is well over 4000 miles which is a LOT for 4 weeks (Tip for route planning - once you've google mapped it, add 20% onto the distance figure. I've no idea why but every time I go we end up doing quite a lot more miles than the planned route suggests).
 
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[TW]Fox;27083352 said:
Good luck finding a rental company who won't palm you off with the worst car they can find for a one-way of that length :p
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Would you be able to swap it at rental locations along the way to avoid them charging so much? i.e. make sure they're aware you're only doing one way trips of say 2-300 miles rather than the full 4,000+.
 
[TW]Fox;27083352 said:
Good luck finding a rental company who won't palm you off with the worst car they can find for a one-way of that length :p

They'll know they will never, ever see it again and you might find they take advantage of that.

I still think you will end up missing out on things by insisting on doing these huge coast-to-coast runs in limited time periods (A month). By not focusing on key areas you end up swapping seeing great things for just.. driving to the next place. For example with a month if you were to do a loop from LA to LA you'd be able to cover a route like this:

LA > Yosemite > SF > Seattle > Glacier National Park, Montana > Yosemite > Utah > Colorado > New Mexico > Arizona > LA

You'd probably end up seeing a load more and saving a bundle on your rental car, too.

Then the year after you could fly into DC and do the other half you didn't do this time, again, with more time to spend actually seeing stuff rather than driving from one side to the other. Your planned route is well over 4000 miles which is a LOT for 4 weeks (Tip for route planning - once you've google mapped it, add 20% onto the distance figure. I've no idea why but every time I go we end up doing quite a lot more miles than the planned route suggests).
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Your first point is interesting. We might well choose to swap cars in Vegas, would that make much difference do you think? It would be nice to do as everyone seems to - and get a Mustang for Route 1>Yosemite>Death Valley, and then swap to something a bit more comfortable and potentially cheaper for the latter part of the trip East.

The point about cramming too much stuff in... I suppose it's relative to you as an individual. A month isn't really what we're planning, it's more like 38 days, which I know doesn't sound like much more but when you actually get to plotting it out day-by-day it makes a big difference in terms of rest days available. We'd look to spend every 3rd to 4th day at 'rest' in a city or national park of interest. My mileage estimate includes about 10% over Google and is 4,892.

The other thing is, coast to coast is the ultimate. It's what I've dreamed of doing since I was 15 or so. It would undoubtedly be awesome to do the loop you described but I think it wouldn't come with the same sense of accomplishment at the end of it. Not that it'll be overly challenging but still. :)
 
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I just got back from my little west coast road trip in the Corvette Convertible.
Auto gearbox, plenty of power for overtaking. Don't recommend driving top down through Death Valley at high noon though.

Got to my last stop in San Diego and my Corvette turned invisible as my hotel was hosting a Lamborghini Owners club meet. Classics, new and a few rare ones including a Reventon. No photos, I'm afraid, 'cos I was out during the daylight hours and only saw them when they were parked up in the underground lot.
 
Anyone done PCH north of SF towards (or to) Seattle? From what I've read so far it looks like a great drive in its own right.
 
I did a big road trip a couple of years ago. Started in Atlanta and went to the Smokey Mountains in TN and stayed with some friends around there, then drove non-stop over through Monument Valley in Utah and decided to stop in Flagstaff, AZ to get some sleep and go to the Grand Canyon, Hoover Dam and Vegas the next day. That took about 36 - 38hrs as we went the 'scenic' route. Never want to do it again, ever.

After Vegas we drove through Death Valley, Yosemite and stopped somewhere on the way to San Fran. Went from $1k per night suite in Vegas to a $20 motel, quite the difference...

After all that it was:

San Fran
LA
San Diego
Tucson, AZ (rest stop)
Austin
New Orleans
Orlando
Atlanta

We did all that in a month so we didn't get to see so much of the cities we stayed in, but I know which cities I'd like to revisit and which I'd like to stay away from.

We'd hired a Ford Expedition which was perfect for us, apart from it's 5.4L V8 liked to drink fuel. We did around 7500 miles and spent roughly $1500 on fuel so it wasn't too bad.

I'd love to do it again but probably spend more time, or fly instead of doing the long drives.
 
[TW]Fox;27106756 said:
Did the coast from Portland to Seattle. Was nice and the Olympic national park is great.
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Cool thanks. And form other accounts that's the bit that isnt all that great (so the bit further south towards SF should be even better!). :)

Thinking of flying to SF, a few nights there, two days drive up the Interstate to Seattle, couple of nights there, then slowly back down the coast road (may nor may not do the Olympic peninsula), and some time in the wine country. Nice and relaxed (which is what the wife wants). Maybe 16-17 days total. :)
 
I think you would get more out of starting and finishing in Seattle and going up to Vancouver then across the Rockies then down into glacier national park in Montana. That trip was incredible.
 
Landed in Florida yesterday, went to the Alamo garage and no Cadillac ATS, not much of a choice apart from lots of SUV's. Spotted a brand new Infinity Q50, seems ok has a 3.7v6 but haven't had the chance to properly test it out yet, will post pics and a mini review when I get the chance.
 
Mini bump. Going to LA end of Jan/beginning of Feb next year. Got to book hire car and various places to stay soon.

Trying to decide between Dollar and Sixt for the hire car from LAX. Can find plenty of bad reviews for both (though Sixt seems to be worse due to there setup from the hotel and not a dedicated lot).
 
Why are you trying to pick between those specifically? IMHO unless you have specialist rental interests (Sixt is good for German cars) then Avis, Hertz and Alamo/National are all better and they are usually around the same price. With a standard rental I would favour Alamo/National as you get to pick your car from the reserved priced.

Be warned with SIXT, they have some bonkers geographical restrictions meaning you can't take the car out of California, Washington, Arizona or Nevada.
 
Hi guys,

I'm starting to start properly planning a California / Nevada road trip for next year and want to get a couple of pointers and best advice.

I was originally planning on starting/ending in San Francisco - but I see a lot of people starting and ending with LA - is this just by preference or is there any particular reason to pick LA over SF to start/end? Cost does't seem too different.

Secondly - from the below stops / very rough route - would clockwise (LA => SF => Yos => DV => LV => SD => LA) or anti-clockwise (LA => SD => LV => DV => Yos => SF => LA) be a better choice?

Original plan/thinking:
San Francisco - 3 night
Yosemite - 1 night
Bishop (or some other mid-point) 1 night
Las Vegas (possible excursion to Grand Canyon) 3 nights
San Diego 2 nights
Something along the coast - 1 night (does this need to be longer as it's such a lot to take in along the way?)
LA - 2 nights
San Francisco - 1 night (for return)

I'm still yet to get into the real detail of the trip, however I have the rough structure down, I'm expecting it'll be in the region of 14-18 nights depending on how much holiday we can carry over in to next year.
 
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