USA trip....where and what.?

makeitstop

Hi all,

Next year is a landmark year for my wife and I for a few reasons, so we are considering going to the USA to nip about a bit and see a few places. I am looking for some advice / tips on where to go and what to see / do while there. Any opinions / suggestions on this will be welcome.

Our thinking was something like this...

Fly to New York / Boston and spend a few days there.

Fly on to Oregon and travel about there for few days to experience some of the incredible scenery etc.

Hire car and drive down west coast as far as San Fransisco, perhaps spending two days there.

Fly from San Fransisco to location close and convenient for Grand Canyon visit. Would love to do a river raft trip on Colorado river while there also.

Fly on from there to location on South Coast, perhaps to spend five days at beach location for rest up.

Fly back to New York, stay maybe overnight or two days and then travel back home to UK.

Any suggestions around that or advice on what to do / not to do would be massively appreciated. As yet, this is unplanned, so we are looking for whatever info we can get.

Many thanks in advance.

tanith

A helicopter trip down into the Grand Canyon was the unmissable part of my US trip a while ago . Loved San Francisco and recommend the Alacatraz trip.

Icequeen99

How long have you got and do you have a budget in mind?

IQ

PeacefulWaters

Wow.

Car hire where you start at one location and finish at another usually incurs significant extra charges. It might work out a lot cheaper to do some sort of loop route with well planned stops.

How many days do you have for the whole trip?

Do you have any air miles from any schemes? If so, how many?

What time of year did you have in mind?

Any particular reason for thinking of doing NYC twice?

HHarry

Just back from San Fran, really enjoyed our stay. 2/3 nights is about right. A second vote for Alcatraz, and can recommend the open top bus or bicycle over the bridge to Sausilito and ferry back.

Coast road south of S.F. is beautiful, particularly Carmel to San Simeon, but possibly further than you want to go.

General advice would be to give yourself longer than you think you need. We were road tripping, arriving in town at 5ish, then leaving again at 10 so not enough time to explore. Would have like 2 nights in some places to give us a chance to look around.

nickcc

We did the Titan tour of the west coast which took in most of your planned stops. Also did the helicopter to the Grand Canyon and the Alcatraz trip. Had a great time without the agro of driving ourselves and missing so much. We usually do the USA at least once a year and often hire cars when staying in one location but to be honest much prefer to be driven.

maman

If you've not been before, You must do all the landmark tourist things in New York: Central Park, Staten Island Ferry to see Statue of Liberty, Times Square, Grand Central Station, Empire State, Brooklyn Bridge.....

mgdavid

Wow indeed; that looks like 5 weeks and 10 grand to me. Is that what you had in mind?

Doshwaster

Personally, I'd stick to one coast and do it well rather than jumping across the country. Coast to coast flights in the US aren't fun. You can always go back and do the other coast another time.

John259

Just a few thoughts and opinions, FWIW:

makeitstop wrote: »

Fly to New York / Boston and spend a few days there.

Because parking and driving in the big northeastern cities is such a pain, it's best to use their public transport systems, and use the Amtrak Northeast Corridor passenger train service to get between them. That service also goes to Philadelphia and Washington DC if those cities interest you.

Fly on to Oregon and travel about there for few days to experience some of the incredible scenery etc.

By car as a road trip, presumably? You could do the coast and/or the Cascade Mountains. East of the Cascades in Oregon is mainly desert or semi-desert, which may or may not be of interest to you of course.

Hire car and drive down west coast as far as San Francisco

That's an extremely scenic and interesting drive. The Pacific Coast Highway between San Francisco and Los Angeles is also very scenic, as someone mentioned earlier especially between the Monterey area and the Morro Bay area.

The entire coast road from Portland to San Diego needs much longer than you'd think with numerous overnight stops. While the roads are perfectly ok they're not fast and there's a lot to see along the way. I'd suggest somewhere such as Florence and Gold Beach in Oregon, Fort Bragg in northern California, then the Monterey area and the Morro Bay area south of San Francisco - just ideas, there are many other permutations, except that there's virtually no accommodation between the Monterey and the Morro Bay area, and because of the coastal mountains there are no public roads inland in that stretch.

perhaps spending two days there (San Francisco).

As with the northeastern cities, a car is somewhat of a liability in central San Francisco, although it's very handy for visiting places nearby such as the Golden Gate Bridge and Muir Woods. Parking at San Francisco city centre hotels can be costly. You might consider staying somewhere outside the city and using public transport such as the BART system to visit the city, unless you wanted to stay in the city until late at night. One option is to stay in a motel north of the Golden Gate Bridge and use the passenger ferry from Tiburon or Sausalito to visit the city.

Fly from San Francisco to location close and convenient for Grand Canyon visit.

You could fly to Las Vegas or Phoenix and that would save time, but it would also miss some wonderful scenery, especially Yosemite National Park which is one of the most beautiful places on Earth. If you have the time available then I'd suggest considering driving instead flying. You'd need a stop in or near Yosemite (at least two nights, preferably three, the park has a lot to see), then another overnight stop in Mammoth Lakes or Bishop or Lone Pine, then another in Las Vegas. (Or perhaps one less stop if you were happy to do some very long drives.)

If you haven't already discovered Google Maps it's a great way of planning a trip like this. https://maps.google.com

Hope this helps a bit. I haven't commented on those aspects of the trip which I'm less familiar with.

blindman

makeitstop wrote: »

Hi all,

considering going to the USA to nip about a bit and see a few places. I am looking for some advice / tips on where to go and what to see / do while there. Any opinions / suggestions on this will be welcome.


Any suggestions around that or advice on what to do / not to do would be massively appreciated. As yet, this is unplanned, so we are looking for whatever info we can get.

Many thanks in advance.

Threads that may help

Anything and everything New York

Las Vegas

SouthWest USA and west coast

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Hotwire hotel guide

USA bus Guide Add to this Boltbus


As has been said:

1 Budget?
2.Duration?
3 Time of year?

Good advice given to stick to one coastline for this trip-You can do the other one next time.:cool:
And then the Deep south, then the Mid west, then Texas etc...

USA is HUGE;) with lots of awesome sights.