Touring holiday to Nevada, California & Arizona

blindman · 22 June 2009 at 3:05PM

kitchensink wrote: »

thats a great idea, but we're off mid sept. I also hear there is a nice deli in bishop so might give that a go on our way up.

There's the Whoa Nellie Deli and this one on the approach road to Tioga Pass.
Had it down for a visit but in the end gave it a miss

funkyfin2000 · 22 June 2009 at 4:31PM

kitchen sink - Blue Butterfly have cheaper rooms at $175 thats the ones we staid in and they were just as fantastic! Any B&B or hotel near yosemite will be extremely pricey!

Furnace Creek - Do you want the cheapest way to get a room rather than booking direct? If you check my replies, search furnace creek and you will see a link to buy the room through a different website. Best get it through that. Only about £90 for the night then! Let me know if you struggle to find the link!

Rich

mich_city · 22 June 2009 at 5:28PM

blindman wrote: »

mich_city
I've just returned from a similar type of tour though did it all the MSE way.(self drive, motels booked individually)

Was away for 16 days in total, drove 4,600 miles and it cost £1500 in total for two of us

I'm in the process of writing a report of how our itinerary and how I managed to keep the costs down.

Hope you have a grand time!

I sort of did it the MSE way too... Tesco paid for the bulk of our hol

Oh doesn't drive and there's no way I would over there.. Will look out for your report..

thanks everyone, am getting giddy now! :rotfl:

jackieblack · 22 June 2009 at 6:48PM

mich_city wrote: »

Oh doesn't drive and there's no way I would over there..

We live in a fairly rural area and don't normally drive more than 8000 miles a year here and I don't drive on motorways (especially the M25 :eek:) but I've driven hundreds of miles in 4 different states of the USA in the past few years and always found it much easier than driving in the UK (apart from LA which is a nightmare!)

blindman · 22 June 2009 at 7:46PM

I believe the secret of cheap travel is planning ahead. Quite a lot of the tips and cheap fares etc have been planned about 1 year or more in advance.

Prior Planning
Money
Signed up for the Abbey Zero credit card a while back and
also have the[STRIKE] Nationwide debit card.[/STRIKE] No longer a best buy overseas.

Hotels.
Sign up for the Holiday Inn Priority Credit card.

That link gets you 20,000 points. Sign up your partner for a separate card and you'll have 40,000 points.
Takes about 3-4 months to sort. Basic hotels can be as low as 10,000 points. They have now started a scheme where you can use award points and cash, some good rates there.
Bonus:- They really messed up and gave me 60,000 point in the end!

Similarly sign up to Hilton credit card

Priceline and Hotwire
I usually book through these for my definite hotel stays e.g. Airport arrival\departures. Don't normally book when on a road trip as there is no flexibility (can't cancel) and on the road I usually go for the cheap motels and there is little saving to be had when using Priceline or Hotwire.

Internet access:
If you need access at airports or at times in hotels where access is quite often not free then sign up to Skype with their monthly plan at $10. It's easy and quick to setup and just about as easy cancel.
Edit No longer doing this type of account.
I used Skype on 3-4 occasions this trip.

Travel to\From the airport
Look out for special offers on the Train\Coach etc.
Get an Oyster card even if you do not live in London (I don't) if you need to travel on London transport. Saves a few quid on the tube and makes travel easier. Costs £3.00 to get one but you can get that refunded if you decide to cancel after the holiday.
TIP
I also use Quidco and Purple parking with the code ITT to get a bargain price.

At the Airport:
I do Mysteryshopping so had two jobs line up where a meal and a drink was paid for as well as a small re-imbursement.
Pro
Passed the time and fed us both prior to a late afternoon flight.
Con
Needed Internet access to complete the report, hence the Skype subscription.
I have lounge access to Star Alliance and OneWorld but this cheap ticket was with Sky Team so no access.

Cheeky Tip
If you're flying with Virgin or Bmi then check the calendars at Flyertalk or V-flyer to see if anyone is offering lounge access.

AirFares
Keep an eye out for any 'mistake' or bargain fares. Look on MSE (of course) Hot Deals UK and possibly Flyertalk
Got this trip airfare due to some Australian brokers (Expedia etc) advertising a mistake fare of £262 for two

Long term planning
Use credit cards etc to accumulate Frequent flyer miles with various airlines. Redeem where necessary. Maybe not worth the effort now as all the extra charges negate any savings unless you fly Business which needs loads of miles. Look out for other Free flight offer include (Airmiles ) but read the small print!

Travel Insurance
Annual is cheaper than single trips (for me anyway- I do more than 2 long hauls per year). Check various options through MSE and got Worldwide Annual for a couple at £43.00 from Protectyourbubble.com

Car Hire
Be careful here as a very cheap price may include a huge excess. Also be wary of one way drop off fees if applicable. (Usually free in CA and FL and also between CA, AZ and UT)
Netflights (Airline network) usually have the best deals (IMHO) but this time found that Virgin were offering a free GPS so took that at the same price.
TIP
Get the smallest car that will suit you, resist the upsell at the rental counter and you may get an upgrade anyway as quite a few places don't have the really small cars.

blindman · 22 June 2009 at 7:47PM

Trip report: Photos here
Day 1
£1.00 coach fare then oyster card to LHR Total £8.00 for two.

NWA to LHR to MSP then to SFO £262 return for two!
Uneventful, reasonably comfortable Video on demand and food OK.

Staybridge Suites SFO Priceline $60 total ($45 bid)
Free shuttle to hotel arrived after 20 mins, comfortable room and good staff
CON : Long day due to stopover, traveling 14hrs airport to airport.

Day 2
Drove over Golden Gate stopped for the view
Golden Gate Bridge is the 101 Cross it to go North watch for the exit to the right. It'll say "Alexander Road". Once off the freeway, the road splits. Take the LEFT branch which will take you under the freeway. Once on the other side of the freeway, the road splits again. Take the RIGHT lane to the Marin Headlands. Up at the top of the hill, park along the road and walk up to the old batteries. Another awesome view.
Then highway 1 up the coast stopping at Mendicino, Avenue of the Giants, Ferndale.
Overnight in Eureka.Rodeway Inn $75

Day 3
North to Redwood National Park, then the GPS got us ‘lost and we ended up going into Oregon before heading South to Reno.
Western Village Inn ($32) Hotwire win at $25
Long day ! 500 miles and arrived at midnight.

Day 4
Reno to Lake Tahoe Beautiful!-on to Mammoth lakes.
Holiday Inn overnight-used some hotel points.

Day 5
Early start (08:00) to drive Tioga Pass to Yosemite.
Awesome views along the road. Stopped in the valley for a while.
Arrived at Peregrine B+B $140 + tax

Day 6 As day 5.
Not much driving, plenty of hiking. Awesome place.

Day 7
Early start, over Tioga pass, around area 51 on the Extra terrestrial highway (stopped at LittleAleInn)
Desolate back roads, with 30 mile straight stretches, easy 500 mile drive..
Overnight at St George Quality Inn $62

Day 8
Head north on the I15 and via scenic byways 14, 89 and 13 .
Stopped at Zion Kolob Canyon, Cedar breaks and Bryce Canyon.
Long haul from Bryce across scenic byway 12
Overnight at Green river Motel 6 $52

Day 9
Highway 95 to Scenic byway 128, then Island in the Sky and then Arches NP.
Wetaher not good for Dead Horse State point so gave it a miss

Shortish drive to Blanding Forgot to pick up booze

at Moab so only had one beer in Blanding (it’s dry town-Indian land!).
Four Corners Inn $70

Day 10
Muley Point,Moki Dugway ,Valley of the Gods, GooseNeck state park.
Weather poor, overcast clouds. Monument Valley at sunset as the weather was grey until about 6 PM.
Overnight at Holiday Inn at Kayenta Award points 15,000

Day 11
Repeat day 10 (except for Valley of the Gods) as clear blue sky. Monument Valley during the day and then at sunset again!
Kayenta Holiday Inn Award points

Day12
Short drive to Page, (Lower) Antelope slot canyon AM then boat trip on Lake Powell PM to Rainbow bridge. Not worth the £70 per person IMHO. Night at Red Rock Motel $55

Day 13
Drive to Grand Canyon North rim, return for Lake Powell sunset pictures.
Red Rock Motel. $55

Day 14
Drive to Grand Canyon South rim, then to Williams Rte 66, Hoover Dam, then Las Vegas for fountains at Bellagio then onto LAX. Check in then drop off rental car. LAX Holiday Inn Priceline.($40 bid) $53 total
700 miles and 18 hour day!

Day 15
LAX to CDG

Day 16
CDG to Paris (Train direct from airport 8 Euro 30 mins). Notre Dame, Left bank of Seine stroll, shopping
Holiday Inn Gare L’Est Award points 15K

Day 17
CDG-LHR Collected by son, home.

Stats:
Total cost: £1,800 (Flights, food, gas, hotels etc).
Drove 4,600 miles over the 15 days. Gas prices varied from $2.50 to $3.30 per gallon.

Research:
Very good web-site for Southwest USA
Accommodation
Criteria was basic but clean for mainly one night overnight stops. All were checked via Tripadvisor for good reviews, non disappointed.

Stayed at Holiday Inns to use free award points otherwise would not have bothered as all were overpriced. Saved about £300 by using award points and not staying in some overpriced flea bag motel in the area.

Using Priceline and Hotwire saved about £150 over the two nights.

Staying in Yosemite saved the time and cost of driving out and back. Probably cost effective and more relaxed.

Savings
Bagging the 'mistake' airfare saved about £300.

Bought the annual National Parks pass (America the Beautiful) for $80.[Sold it on Ebay for £40 :cool:]
(Cash, as lots of Ranger sites do not accept credit cards) when we entered Yosemite. Total cost for all parks (8 of) we visited would have been $133.

Food
Most days lunch was a shared 12” subway as they were on offer for $5.00 and easily fed the two of us until evening.
Evening meals were a bit hit and miss, mainly Pizza or easily made “TV dinners. Ate out about 4-5 times whilst on the road due to time or location.

Overall saving through prudent planning and a bit of luck was at least £800.00

Negatives
Had visited San Francisco\Big sur etc before and had two days to kill before going to Yosemite (pre booked no cancel-also hoping the pass would be oopen later) so a trip to the big redwoods was a time filler. Not an awesome drive really and the drive back to Reno was long and tiring.

Murphy_The_Cat · 22 June 2009 at 10:19PM

A little while ago, I lost all of my bookmarks, so I've not been back onto this thread for a bit.

I'm absolutely astonished, delighted and dead chuffed that so many people are keeping it alive, making use of it and adding to it - great stuff

p.s. I'll pop off and start a Touring Holiday To Texas thread now, for my hold next Spring;):D

funkyfin2000 · 24 June 2009 at 8:38PM

Murphy! You are the man that inspired us to go!!! So keep following

blindman - Top dog!! What a guide

Murphy_The_Cat · 25 June 2009 at 9:30PM

funkyfin2000 wrote: »

Murphy! You are the man that inspired us to go!!! So keep following

blindman - Top dog!! What a guide

thank you, thats very kind.
I'm so sorry that I lost my impetus and ability to post so often after I came back, as there was so much more to share with folk.

lynzpower · 25 June 2009 at 9:42PM

Blindman what a fantastic truip report- makes me wanna go!!!!!!

Touring holiday to Nevada, California & Arizona

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