California - hiring an RV for a few weeks

photome

cubegame wrote: »

I would love to RV in the US but the cost and lack of freedom to stop by the roadside is a killer. You would also miss on on the bits that an RV can't get to.

Thats a very good point, All the US owned RV,s tow a car behind for that very reason.

may be a good enough reason to forget about it and stick with the Car/motel route

cubegame

photome wrote: »

Thats a very good point, All the US owned RV,s tow a car behind for that very reason.

may be a good enough reason to forget about it and stick with the Car/motel route

It does depend on what you're planning to see though. It will always be more expensive than winging it with motels though. Just such a shame you can't just pull up on the road.

nixxxi17

I was lucky enough to spend 2 months driving in America a few years ago. Flew into Vegas, then Death Valley, Mammoth Mountain, Lake Tahoe, San Fran down to San Diego (Highway 101) then Palm Springs, Sedona, Grand Canyon and back to Vegas. It was fantastic.

I agree that an RV would probably limit you in terms of the places you can access and they are expensive to run. I found the hotels/motels were so cheap, it was far simpler to pop into a Denny's for a yummy breakfast and grab a brochure which they always have lying around (as do all the gas stations) with lists of hotels and promotional rates in. A quick call to the hotel will nearly always secure you a better price than advertised. The English accent goes a long way!

Hope you have a fantastic time and please can I come too?

LEJC

having just recently returned from Florida I was surprised at the size of RVs...they seem to be the size of a coach nowadays,and it was usual to see them towing a smaller car behind making it a very long vechile!

Looked well equiped an spacious,but I didnt see anything that was particularly small...so my advice would be check the size you go for....petrol/gas was cheap at around 3.20 dollars per gallon

mgdavid

photome wrote: »

Any tips on where to hire for the west coast

no, I just googled and did the usual sensible research.
It's worth saying that not all US RVs are 40 foot Winnebagos, they do normal (to us) -sized RVs too; I don't think you'll find too many places you 'can't get to', we managed to park in Key West no problem and that's a pretty crowded sort of place... also no probs at Kennedy Space centre or the Dali museum in St Petersburg or any beaches etc etc. The yanks are tourist-friendly - they don't fit horizontal steel bars at 7' high like UK holiday resorts do....

ETA - on only the second site I looked at I found that cruiseamerica do a 19-footer, that's smaller than the race van I use over here and a doddle to get around in.

maggiesoop

Thanks for all the info. I take on board the cost of hiring an RV - and the cost of gas - compared to hiring a car and booking into cheap motels, however the motels we stayed in (Super8 type) were 60 dollars plus taxes for a double room (reasonably off peak, ie 18 and 19 Dec, they seemed quiet) so didn't think it was feasible if we were going away for a long time.