Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

How long did it take you-- how many stops did you make, etc.??

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

Message edited 10/11/2006 9:22:51 AM.

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

I was thinking that this may be a more economical and interesting vacay to take this spring.

I have always wanted to do it-- and this is something that I think we should do before we have kids.

I am all about the doing things before we procreate thing!

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

Message edited 10/11/2006 9:22:45 AM.

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

I did this right after college - but went an odd route. Friends of mine were moving out to LA, so I took the ride for a goof. We made our stops based on where we knew people and could crash and stretched it a bit for fun!

If I remember correctly:
Day 1 - from Philly to Minneapolis (left first thing in the morning, got to MN in the middle of the night and crashed at a friend's for a few hours.

Day 2- Minneapolis to Fargo, ND. (Had dinner & stayed the night at another friend's apartment)

Day 3 - From Fargo to Reeder, ND (One of my college roommate's (the one moving to LA) grew up there so we stayed for a few nights to visit her family's farm - unfortunately, I got pnemonia and spent this time in a hospital).

Day 6 - Out of the hospital and back on the road against MD's orders! Reeder ND to Yellowstone. (Spent the night in a hotel)

Day 7 - Yellowstone to somewhere in Idaho (another Motel 6 hotel night)

Day 8 - My 22nd birthday - perfectly timed with our arrival to Vegas (spent another night in the hotel).

Day 9 - Destination LA.

I'm glad I did it. It was a great time (despite my illness). I thought my mom would kill me when I moved home after college and announced I wouldn't need to look for a job immediately b/c I'd be driving across country in a U-Haul. Luckily, she agreed and paid for my return flight.

Message edited 9/20/2006 5:52:28 PM.

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

no, but i'd love to

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

4 days and it was amazing.
We stopped in Vegas for an hour, stayed the night somewhere outside of Denver, stayed the next night in Nebraska, the last stop was in Madison to see my cousins friend and then home.

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

you might want to do a northern route going west then the southern route coming back east. You can see more things and you arent traveling that same route

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

The farthest I have drive is AZ and it took 3 days.

I highly recommend passng through Moab, Utah and if you have time, go whiet water rafting there. Really fun!

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

I drove from San Francisco to NY back when I was in college. It took us about a week.

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

I took a long trip and stopped a lot with a friend. I was living in San Francisco at the time. We came east on a southern route, and took about 3-3.5 weeks and then when we went back west on a northern route, taking about 2.5 weeks. I can pull out my stuff and list all our stops if you are interested, but we stopped at a lot of the National Parks:

Seqouia
Grand Canyon
Bryce Canyon/Zion
Hot Springs, AK
Smoky Mountains
Yellowstone
Mount Rushmore

It was a wonderful experience, but we were both teachers and had the summer off, so we had a lot of flexibility with time.

When I moved back here, we drove from SF to NY in about 5 days with one stop to visit someone for a day.

Message edited 9/21/2006 6:34:10 PM.

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

thanks girls for your responses-- I am thinking of taking like 2 weeks to do this trip-- there and back-- maybe we drive one way, then fly back-- but then we can't take our own car which is annoying.

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

You may want to check the weather, depending on when you are going. I know areas like Yellowstone get snow early (like starting about now) and may still have it in the earlier spring months.

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

I did this after college as well. My girlfriend and I were gone for about 4 weeks. We had a blast. We drove up to Niagra went across through Ohio, stopped at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. Went onto South Dakota and the black hills/badlands area. Through to Yellowstone, stayed with her boyfriend who was working there for the summer. Then on through Idaho, Montana, California. Went to Sequia National Park, drove through Yosemite (didn't reserve and nothing was available) Hung out in the Lake Tahoe area. Spent some time in Arizona. We saw a lot and had a great time. We did a lot of camping unless it was raining. Definitely have no regrets about not getting a job right after college and taking the summer off. I want to do it again when I am retired in an RV and drive up to Alaska.

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

I drove cross country (there and back) in 2.5 weeks. We left in early September and first went to Canada and then came back down through Detroit (odd route, I know).

I do know that you have to take into consideration what time of year you're going and when you'll hit some of the mid-western states. In September, we had to go more south than we wanted to avoid some slick conditions already in the moutains.

It was an awesome experience though - you'll love it!

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

I -80 can be bad in the winter/early spring

but you can take I-70 year round

I drove from NY to Colorado and back

I went to school there- from CO we drove to New Mexico, Arizona, Utah

I highly recommend Sedona, AZ and Arches National park in Utah- I yes me- actually slept outside there- it was beautiful

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

I did this out of college too. We rented a car one way and flew back. We tried to stay with friends where we could - Baltimore, Atlanta and San Diego.

We also stopped in New Orleans, Arizona and finished in LA - where we flew back.

I think we did 2.5 weeks

Re: Ok-- anyone ever drive cross-country??

I did a year after college with 3 other friends. We were gone about 5 weeks I think (end of July to the end of Aug). We drove the southern route there and the northern route back. We stayed in Motel 6s alot and other random hotels as we found them. We went to: (In about this order)
Nashville
Memphis (Graceland)
New Orleans
Houston
Dallas
Sedona AZ
4 corners - where 4 states meet up
Las Vegas
Lake Tahoe
LA
San Francisco
Boulder CO
Rapid City SD - Mt Rushmore
Milwaukee, WI
Chicago
Cleveland - Rock N Roll Hall of Fame

It was great. We had a fun time and I hope to some day do it again with my DH and kids.