California & Vegas Fly Drive

NiftyDigits

dazanteney4 wrote: »

Ok thanks. Let's check the web and see if i can get good priced flights!

Flying in to SFO and out of San Diego?

dazanteney4

NiftyDigits wrote: »

Flying in to SFO and out of San Diego?

Yeah atm that's what it looks like, unless flying out of LA is £100's cheaper.

John259

If you plan to fly into one city and out from another, look for "open jaw" or "multi city" options which will usually be far less expensive than separate one-way tickets.

If you book the car rental through an agency outside the USA you should be able to avoid a one-way rental drop-off fee between any two locations in California, Nevada and Arizona.

gracie10

We just got back from this trip on Sunday. Although we didn't do San Fran this time (did that 2 years ago). Had the most amazing 3 weeks.
We booked it all ourselves and had great fun planning it all. We get a 0% credit card on purchases, that way we can pay the flights off over the year and most of the hotels only take a small deposit.
I would do San Diego after LA, then fly home from Vegas.
Happy to help with any questions. Already talking about going back next year!!

dazanteney4

gracie10 wrote: »

We just got back from this trip on Sunday. Although we didn't do San Fran this time (did that 2 years ago). Had the most amazing 3 weeks.
We booked it all ourselves and had great fun planning it all. We get a 0% credit card on purchases, that way we can pay the flights off over the year and most of the hotels only take a small deposit.
I would do San Diego after LA, then fly home from Vegas.
Happy to help with any questions. Already talking about going back next year!!

Sounds great! We were thinking about doing SF > LA > Vegas > SD.
Any advice for us? IE things to do or not bother with?

duchy

hotels.com are rather nice at the moment as you can get a decent Quidco cashback plus hotels.com themselves have a book 10 nights and get a free night so you could have the first night of the next trip paid for before you even get home

I'm currently doing my last couple of hotel bookings on my trip in just over two weeks time- I got a nice deal for Salt Lake City with priceline (half price compared with expedia etc and four star city centre-I was able to work out which hotel it was before I booked) and am just about to decide if I'm going to Hotwire my first and last night or book a specific hotel with hotels.com.

I tend to book the flights then book the various hotels as and when a good deal or sale comes up so I'm spreading the cost but usually prepay all nights so it doesn't eat into the "spending" budget.

gracie10

dazanteney4 wrote: »

Sounds great! We were thinking about doing SF > LA > Vegas > SD.
Any advice for us? IE things to do or not bother with?

We really loved San Diego and wish we had spent longer there. It depends what you like to do. We had our 2 children with us, so going to be a bit different from being on honeymoon!!


We flew into LA, stayed at Manhatten Beach, Anaheim, Long Beach ( on the Queen Mary) Dana Point, San Diego, Palm Springs, 29 Palms, Laughlin and ended up in Vegas.


Our last trip was LA, Pismo Beach, Monterry, San Fran, Yosemite, Death Valley and Vegas.


Would recommend using hotwire for your hotel in San Fran.

dazanteney4

gracie10 wrote: »

We really loved San Diego and wish we had spent longer there. It depends what you like to do. We had our 2 children with us, so going to be a bit different from being on honeymoon!!


We flew into LA, stayed at Manhatten Beach, Anaheim, Long Beach ( on the Queen Mary) Dana Point, San Diego, Palm Springs, 29 Palms, Laughlin and ended up in Vegas. .

How did you find LA? Driving around etc?

gracie10

To be honest we don't like LA. We went 2 years ago and did all the touristy things. This time we didn't even stop just went straight to Manhattan Beach after the flight.
Driving wise it's very busy and can take you a long time to get places depending on time of day.

John259

gracie10 wrote: »

To be honest we don't like LA.

Nor me, but it's probably better to think of Los Angeles in terms of its various suburbs and evaluate each one separately. So IMHO Santa Monica is pleasant if bland and expensive, Hollywood is a tourist trap dump, Anaheim/Disneyland is well worth a day even if you don't normally like that type of thing because it's not a roller coaster park, and Universal appeals to the amusement park lovers. FWIW I've also heard good reports of Huntington Beach and the Griffith Observatory. That's far from a full list of course, the place is enormous.