Western US Road Trip Tips
So the road trip has been over for a little over a week now and since then I’ve been to Detroit, Miami and back again. Now that I am between packing and cleaning, I wanted to get a recap in.
Matyas and I rented a Buick Lucerne and headed south out of Las Vegas on July 24th. We drove 5,615.6 miles south, east, northwest, north, southwest, every which way you can imagine. From Vegas we went to the Grand Canyon followed by Monument Valley in Utah, Salt Lake City, Idaho Falls, Jackson Hole, Wyoming, Yellowstone National Park, Glacier National Park, Montana, Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, Seattle, Vancouver, Portland, Pacific Coast Highway, Napa Valley, San Francisco, Yosemite National Park, Sequoia National Park, and LA. By the time all was said and done, we visited nine states, two countries, tons of friends, and I took well over 2000 pictures. We arrived back in Las Vegas on August 7th. Even though there were a couple arguments and a bit of tension, the good times definitely outweighed the bad and the experience is one that I will treasure. I implore everyone to find time and take a road trip in the western United States. The sites are absolutely breathtaking and quite frankly, I didn’t know that this beauty existed in this country of ours.
A few tips
- Set a loose itinerary in the beginning so that you set aside the right amount of time, but leave leeway for exploring. I wish we had more time, we rushed through some of the places that we visited.
- Stop in small towns for meals.
- If you are going to more than three national parks, by the annual pass in advance. The pass is $80 and there are discounts for certain people. We spent well over that because of poor planning.
- To save money, stay with friends along the way, if you don’t have friends in the region that you are traveling, try couchsurfing.
