California fly drive advice

Miles16v

Hi,

I'm organising a surprise honeymoon for my wife to be, and am thinking about a Californian fly drive.

I've had a look around and reckon its cheaper to book it all yourself than to go through an agent.

Here's what I'm thinking.

Route:
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=d&source=s_d&saddr=San+Francisco,+CA,+USA&daddr=south+lake+tahoe+to:mammoth+lakes+to:Las+Vegas,+NV,+USA+to:San+Diego,+CA,+USA+to:Los+Angeles,+CA,+USA&hl=en&geocode=&gl=uk&mra=ls&sll=33.67864,-119.421387&sspn=4.213891,10.821533&ie=UTF8&z=6
San Fran (3 nights) > Lake Tahoe (1 night) > Yosemite (2 nights) > Las Vegas (3 nights) > San Diego (2 nights) > LA (3 nights).

We like walking so thought Lake Tahoe and Yosemite would be good. However might ditch Lake Tahoe to make it less frantic?

About 1100 miles driving in 14 days.

BA flights - £800
Convertible - £450
Accom (3-5*) - £1200
Helicopter to the Grand Canyon - £400

Can you book BA flights cheaper through agents than you can direct? All the comparison sites dont seem to like split city flights.

Any thoughts on the route?

Must do things in the area?

Places I've missed / changes you'd make?

All appreciated, as I'm very much feeling myself through what seems reasonable.

All help much appreciated, and might just save a divorce before its even started!

poet123

Not sure about BA flight costs elsewhere, but also not sure if in the present climate I would be booking BA flights for such an important "once in a lifetime" occasion. Imagine they announce strike plans for the weekend of your wedding, and think about would you have the money and time to sort out an alternative, or would you have to scrap the honeymoon? Just a thought. Although you could be booking for 2011/12 which may be different.

ferf1223

I'd do Vegas -> LA -> San Diego rather than Vegas -> San Diego -> LA...unless the plan here is to end up in LA to fly home. Though overall I do think you may be takingon too much - it will be a lot of driving as you've already discovered.

Kayak and Expedia both allow multi-city options for checking flights...not sure what you mean by comparison sites not liking split city flights?

Caz3121

nothing to add but to say I will be watching this thread as we are thinking of doing the same thing - any ideas what time of year is best?

jaypr

When are you planning to go?

With regards to Yosemite some roads are closed due to snow and only open in late April, early June. Also if you go from September onwards the waterfalls are running dry as is Mirror Lake.

Jason

truman_sparks

Did similar but for longer, spending on av 1 day less at each place, it was alittle too hectic ( 3600+ miles/ 16 days) as another poster thinks this may be for you. Roads are slower driving takes longer but i enjoy driving etc so would have no problem with your suggetion. LA is only 2 hrs drive from San diego so thats 5 days of little driving! Have you considered trying to link LA with San fransisco it makes a loop then and may give you cheaper flights allowing a couple of extra nights if the time is available.

The reason i say this is you could use the coast road up through malibu (jim rockford territory, stop for lunch at paradise cove and say hi!) you will then travel north through the Big Sur national park, some of the most spectacular scenery for a drive that you will not forget, then either a night at santa cruz (not much their tbh) or push on to SF. its a long drive up the coast so best to split it with a stop and the scenery is great. def worth considering imo.

The queen mary in LA is something to remember and not overly expensive ($110pn for a couple i think i paid, shop around).

what ever you do will be great, but if you get pulled over, DONT GET OUT. and keep your hands in view, haha.

TS

my route edit,
16 days in July 2008

Vegas-flagstaff-albuquerqe- el paso-mexico boarder(big bend national park)-tucson-san diego- LA (staying on the Queen mary)-Santa cruz-S.F-Vegas-home-bed!

Miles16v

Thanks for the replies. Going Beginning of June 2010.

Was planning to fly from LA. You can fly from San Diego, but it requires a transfer and puts the cost up loads.

Split city flight, I meant multi city. I'll check out Kayak and Expedia.

tyson2

Hi, used to work for Tour op as USA team leader, many yrs in travel and lived in the states too, this is my opinion:

Taking on too much, you will have very little time in each place on this itinerary, some people love driving and that suits them, but you may want to rethink. First off what type of holiday are you after, if you want to do walking and relaxing then you could do San fran, napa valley, yosemite, death valley, las Vegas, leaving out LA and San Diego altogether. La is massive, you have to drive everywhere and can be hard to navigate, it eats time and is not for everyone, however there is lots to see, Beverly Hills, Muscle beach, Manns chinese theatre etc, so if you fancy it then make sure you have enough time to see what you want there. San Diego's main attractions are beach, Zoo and Sea world, personally it's really not worth bothering with unless you specifically want to see one of the above.
Now if you really want the full California fly-drive experience and not so bothered about the walking, then I would fly into San fran and then take the Pacific coast hightway (route 1) along the coast down to LA stopping at Monterey, then onto Las Vegas, you could go via Death Vally if you wanted to experience. This is a tried and tested way to do it and driving along route 1 is amazing and very enjoyable, this is a relaxing way to do the trip and gives you some beach time too.

Hope this helps

tyson2

Oh and try calling someone like netflights if you want to fly into one city and out of another, they can do this easily, but will normally have to quote you over phone

truman_sparks

I only had 1/2 a day in San diego but its the one place that stuck in my mind when i got home that i defnatley want to go back too, the gas lamp part of town in the evening is great, nice retaurants a real buzz,

funny how opinions vary, i dont do zoos etc,I just thought it a very nice clean interesting city.

ts

ferf1223

Miles16v wrote: »

Split city flight, I meant multi city. I'll check out Kayak and Expedia.

the main thing with a multi-city journey is finding a carrier that flies into/out of both...otherwise prices will skyrocket as you'll basically have 2 1-way fares. We've found before with Virgin at least that flying into say Chicago and home from Vegas can sometimes be basically the same price as a return from Chicago (even after factoring in an internal flight from Chicago to Vegas)...handy when you have family near Chicago but love Vegas.

I generally agree with tyson2 on San Diego - though it's a lovely city, and a tram ride from Tijuana if you fancy a quick trip to Mexico too...we didn't actually do the zoo, beach or Sea World when we went, but we were only there one night...we arrived from LA, then drove from SD to Vegas which was really a silly way to do it as we basically doubled back on ourselves to get from SD to Vegas when we'd started in LA. But I can see that there may be a benefit of doing it that way if flights work out a lot cheaper.