Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Hey guys, I'll be graduating college this coming May and my 2 friends and I are planning to do a 3 month road trip across the US. I wanted to ask you guys if you guys have ever done one of these trips before and what you guys did during the trip (how much money you spent, camping, tips, etc)? We also have a Go Fund Me page up and running as well if you guys would like to see that.
I have taken a 3+year road trip does that count? I had a 5th wheel trailer, my wife would take travel nurse jobs and I would take all sorts of kinds of various jobs, plumbing, carpentry, farming, etc. we never stayed in a place for more than 3 months and just recently settled down. (Planning on buying a school bus and converting it as we speak to do it again .)
Anyways my piece of advice for you would be to avoid interstates at all costs. Tip small town waitresses well. Don't have any sort of set plan in stone. Head to the NORTH rim of the Grand Canyon (this is very important, not the south rim) hike to the bottom, do A LOT of camping. Do A lot of hiking. Climb a 14er. Head West. Avoid chain hotels. Avoid chain restaurants. Always be willing to help somebody out. Hit up Colorado. Hit up Moab. Avoid bigger cities. Be open to changes of plans. Air bnb. Roll with the punches. Learn to cook your own breakfast on a small two burner camp stove to save money. Instant coffee. Salami sandwiches. Always have a cooler with food and drinks. Always carry a roll of a toliet paper and a small shovel. Tread lightly. Leave no trace. Spend money on brand new tires. I could go on and on.
Anyways for three months what kind of vehicle to have? If it's some sort of truck maybe you could pool together money for a cheap small travel trailer and put some new tires on it. You can find decent trailers for ~3k compared to $50-$100 a night for a hotel for 3 months. If your out west you can do a lot of camping. Dont camp in or near a wash in the summer. Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, California, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, Utah are all very cool. Good luck.
I've done several 3 month road trips, and it was a blast . Go north and west, if you are on a budget stick to the state parks, or better yet BLM and National Forrest Service lands. Stay off the interstates, look for the blue highways, and if you see something you want to see, STOP. I don't remember what it cost, basically food and tank of gas per day, and some days a shower either at a truck stop or KOA.
I hope one of you knows how to fix a car, and has tools
Sorry, I'm not donating to you vacation, You boys are young, work a day or two a week to make some scratch
In 1972 I did a three month road trip with a friend from Houston, Texas to Hermosa Beach, California, hitchhiking. We camped along the way except in Colorado when we stayed for two weeks in a rented cabin at a small lodge. We stayed with friends in California before hitching back to Houston. I left with 200 dollars and arrived back in Houston with 20 cents in my pocket. I used a dime to make a phone call to a friend to pick us up and bought a popsicle with the last dime. I guess it's too dangerous to do that nowadays.
No. I worked during the summers. The longest road trip I took was 3 weeks when I was a child (Detroit-Vegas, with stops at all of the sites in between). Great fun, but our family was going to strangle each other at the end. We spent nights either in motels, or car-camped at campsites.
Lol at crowdsourcing your trip. At least try to blog about it to drive internet traffic, and signup for google/youtube Adsense to try to get some nickles and dimes to fund stuff along the way.
I did a 3 month road trip, post HS, 1965...30 states plus a lost week in Mexico.
We did a 2 month Road Trip a couple summers ago in our VetteVert: 36 states, 4 provinces of CDA, great two lane mountain roads, etc.
I camped/slept in car/on the ground back in '65, when I was 17; we stay in nice motels now at 67 yrs old.
Good tips above from previous posters...
Car should be in decent shape, skip the interstates other than getting to next great Nat Park, be careful but most of the less populated US is absolutely remarkable to see, and the majority of people are not what one sees on the screaming media news.
I'm passing on the FundMe deal too: no silver spoons for that kind of adventure. You just got of the U, figure it out.
GL, mD
Did a 6-week one throughout the US right after college (1989), focusing on a combination of cities and natural attractions. What worked for us was:
Cooler for food/drink for breakfast and lunch is essential. We had a standing 'rule' that unless we were somewhere special we'd make our own breakfasts and lunches. Too many greasy spoons isn't exactly the same as experiencing local flavor.
We tried to use interstates only when we had 'transit' days between points of interest. Sure you could say that the in between places are interesting, and it is somewhat true, but there were days for us (and maybe having 3 months you don't have to worry about it) where we needed to rack up some miles to get to our next park or city...so we could spend more time there. For us, better to hightail it one day to be able to spend 3 days in Needles than drive 2 days to get 2 days there. Made sense to us.
I personally think that for the nights you would spend in a hotel (vs. camping or couch surfing) it is worth considering chains. Like maybe join the loyalty club of one chain and use it a lot and maybe get some freebies over 3 months.
Make sure to discuss $$ with your co-travelers before you go. This was vitally important to us. For instance, we loosely agreed that when we were in an iconic city, we'd loosen up our wallets somewhat and experience the local food, even if it was just deep dish in Chicago or something. We weren't going to be in a great city and eat PB&J...that was for the boring spaces in between. If people have different ideas going in, best to get them all sorted out before you leave.
Ditto for discussing time spent apart. We carved out days when we would explicitly be OK splitting up and exploring on our own.
We did a Route 66 backwards (from LA) trip in 2011 that continued on to NYC, the Outer Banks and Nashville before heading back. Did lots of research, lots of planning, ate lots of good road food. No camping.
Did a three month one thru Australia once. We almost always cooked our meals for a family of 4 and we mostly camped in tents though that got old on some days and we'd rent one of those little mini-trailers they called caravans at a campground. We could have camped for very cheap or even free most nights but I and my two daughters felt we needed comfortable bathrooms. When we got tired of Oz we did another month in New Zealand and when we got tired of that we went to Asia and then camped our way thru Europe, same way. I'm ready to go again and so are my girls.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
.)
. Go north and west, if you are on a budget stick to the state parks, or better yet BLM and National Forrest Service lands. Stay off the interstates, look for the blue highways, and if you see something you want to see, STOP. I don't remember what it cost, basically food and tank of gas per day, and some days a shower either at a truck stop or KOA.
