Southwest USA & The West Coast (California, Arizona etc) - General Thread

northwest1965

TheBetterHalf wrote: »

Hello USA travellers,
have been enjoying reading all your posts. My wife and I are travelling to LA in december and I have been trying to put together an itinerary. I was wondering if you might add your 2 cents to the master plan! I followed some advice on here and used ch3000.
Dec 1st - Land in LA 7.15pm. Stay the night in LA
Dec 2nd - Hollwood sightseeing etc. Stay the night in LA
Dec 3rd - Check out muscle beach in the morning. Drive to south rim of Gran canyon (8 hours)!. Stay at Gran Canyon
Dec 4th - visit Gran Canyon, go wow. Drive to Vegas. Stay in Vegas
Dec 5th - Vegas, stay in Vegas
Dec 6th - Leave Vegas early, drive through Death Valley, cut west across towards bakersfield. Stay somewhere here for the night.
Dec 7th - Continue west to hit the coast near San Luis Obispo then drive up highway 1 and the big sur to San Fran. Stay in San Fran.
Dec 8th - 11th - Stay in San Fran
11th Fly out of San fran

Is this a bit rushed - i.e the 8 hour (at least) drive from LA to GC. I could swap a san fran night for an extra night to break that journey up but is it worth taking my time along that route or should I get it over and done with?

thanks

Hi and welcome:)

Thats one hell of a lot of driving. Use google directions as a guide, if it says 8hrs, add on stops and extra driving time. Are you doing all the driving?

For us, just driving through Death Valley is a sin!:) I'd have to stay the night there.

It depends on what type of places you like, are you a city/beach/country lover?

blindman

TheBetterHalf wrote: »

Hello USA travellers,
have been enjoying reading all your posts. My wife and I are travelling to LA in december and I have been trying to put together an itinerary. I was wondering if you might add your 2 cents to the master plan! I followed some advice on here and used ch3000.
Dec 1st - Land in LA 7.15pm. Stay the night in LA
Dec 2nd - Hollwood sightseeing etc. Stay the night in LA
Dec 3rd - Check out muscle beach in the morning. Drive to south rim of Gran canyon (8 hours)!. Stay at Gran Canyon
Dec 4th - visit Gran Canyon, go wow. Drive to Vegas. Stay in Vegas
Dec 5th - Vegas, stay in Vegas
Dec 6th - Leave Vegas early, drive through Death Valley, cut west across towards bakersfield. Stay somewhere here for the night.
Dec 7th - Continue west to hit the coast near San Luis Obispo then drive up highway 1 and the big sur to San Fran. Stay in San Fran.
Dec 8th - 11th - Stay in San Fran
11th Fly out of San fran

Is this a bit rushed - i.e the 8 hour (at least) drive from LA to GC. I could swap a san fran night for an extra night to break that journey up but is it worth taking my time along that route or should I get it over and done with?

thanks

Each to his own but I think that is too rushed and not the way I'd do it.

Our last trip we stopped overnight in LA and then did the all sights the following day (you'll be up early due to jet lag)
Plan the route and use a Sat Nav.
This got us leaving the LA area mid afternoon for a slow drive to Vegas arriving as the lights came on.
As Vegas never sleeps you could either hit the town or bed then have a further day or two there.
It's then "only" 5 hours or so the the GC where you can arrive mid morning and have a full day here. Remember the sun will go down early as it Dec.

After the ovenight stop you could then make your way back to the West Coast with an overnight stop somewhere (don't book this just stop where ever you end up).

Hearst Castle may be on you itinerary too?

Are you using Priceline for your first night in LA?

jackieblack

8 hours from LA to Grand Canyon seems a tad optimistic - we did this over 2 days with an overnight stop at Lake Havasu and it still felt like 2 long days of driving.
There are lots of great quirky little places to stop if you get off the highway in Arizona and use old Rt 66 instead.

TheBetterHalf

northwest1965 wrote: »

Are you doing all the driving?

My Wife and I are both on the car hire, hopefully she will be doing half!

Very much looking forward to driving through Death Valley. Wasn't even on our original itinerary but a friend did it recently and said its a must.

elantan

death valley is fantastic you will really enjoy it, we did it in August and really enjoyed it, we then drove alongside the sierra nevada ridgeway past mammoth lakes etc with mt whitney on the left hand side, really really lovely scenery

TheBetterHalf

blindman wrote: »

Are you using Priceline for your first night in LA?

Oh dear, I'd never heard of this and have spent many many hours trawling for accommo in budget but have now booked it all! Doh
Many thanks though, will certainly investigate further

TheBetterHalf

Can't believe Route 66 has not existed since 1985. Not one person I've told this too knew it didn't exist anymore. (I know they haven't ripped up all the road and its still possible to drive parts)

northwest1965

TheBetterHalf wrote: »

Can't believe Route 66 has not existed since 1985. Not one person I've told this too knew it didn't exist anymore. (I know they haven't ripped up all the road and its still possible to drive parts)

Didnt Billy Connoly do a tv programme last year?

northwest1965

TheBetterHalf wrote: »

My Wife and I are both on the car hire, hopefully she will be doing half!

Very much looking forward to driving through Death Valley. Wasn't even on our original itinerary but a friend did it recently and said its a must.

We loved it so much, will be spending 2 nights in the area!

vanilla8

Its been 4 years since our last trip to the west coast, we did san fran-yosemite-death valley-vegas-lake havusu-la-san diego and then flight back from la.

We have just booked flights into and out of san fran for next June, for 15 nights. We are now trying to plan!

we want to do the drive down through montery,carmel etc, and will avoid LA this time. Most probably head over to vegas for a few nights before driving back to san francisco. Does anyone have any recommendations for the route back from vegas?