In summer 2019, we spent a total amount of 31 days in the USA, from July 24 to August 23. Our starting as well as ending point was San Francisco. All in all we drove 6741 kilometers, that’s 4172 miles. Our journey went across 4 states: California, Arizona, Utah and Nevada. On this road trip, we have really seen A LOT, but we weren’t in a rush and took our time to explore as much of everything the USA has to offer. Planning such a long trip isn't that easy and needs a lot of research. So here is our complete itinerary, which might help you to plan your own road trip :)
|
Recommendations
For this route, 4 weeks was the perfect duration for us... We were never in a hurry, we sometimes spent 4-5 days at the same place, as for example in San Francisco, Los Angeles or Las Vegas. We only booked the accommodations for the first week from home, as for the rest of our trip we wanted to stay as flexible as possible. Before our departure, we came up with a rough plan what we wanted to do/see on each day. This was quite helpful in order not to fall too far behind our schedule and we always had a rough idea of how much time/distance we had left until we had to be back at our starting point San Francisco. However, the schedule was often changed e.g. when we liked a place and wanted to stay longer, when we found even more interesting things to see or when we didn't like a place and left early. Our recommendation for a west coast road trip:
- HIRE A CAR: distances are often long, and public transport isn't that great as soon as you leave the bigger cities behind. Enjoy the freedom of being independent from any bus or train schedules and simply go where you want to - for us this was our first self-drive trip, and I guess we never want to travel differently anymore :D
- STAY FLEXIBLE: do not book everything in advance. We made our road trip during high season, and we were also a little bit worried if we would always find a last-minute place to sleep, but we never had any problems. We simply drove until we were tired and then logged into a public wi-fi and booked a nearby motel for the night. Exceptions: accommodation in LA, SF and Page, tickets/permits for Alcatraz, Antelope Canyon, Havasu Falls, Coyote Buttes
- DOWNLOAD OFFLINE MAPS: in order to avoid the costs of renting a navigation system, there are several free navigation apps, as for example maps.me or googlemaps. We personally preferred maps.me, as it doesn't need as much storage space as other apps. It's free, easy to handle and very reliable!
- TAKE TURNS DRIVING: you might have to pay a few dollars extra in order to have two or more registered drivers, but there will be moments when you will be really glad about it. As already said, distances are long and after some hours of driving straight ahead in noman's land you will become tired. Safety first!
- ENJOY YOUR TRIP: take your time when you are on a road trip. There is so much to see and who knows when you will come back to that place. Do everything you like, visit the places you love, but also don't hesitate to skip or leave a place early if you don't like it. It's YOUR trip and the most important thing is that you have the time of your lives <3
READ MORE ABOUT OUR ROAD TRIP
WATCH OUR ROADTRIP VIDEO HERE
Kommentar schreiben