Tips for travelling round USA?

lyle1993

Flying to USA for a few weeks in the summer, going to try and do 3/4 different cities...want to try and do flights/accommodation as cheap as possible, any tips for what type of accommodation we should be going for and any other moneysaving tips? How much should I take with me?
Thanks

PeacefulWaters

lyle1993 wrote: »

Flying to USA for a few weeks in the summer

Make sure you have your ESTA in place. If it's declined it might take a couple of months to get an appointment for a visa.

going to try and do 3/4 different cities...

There is a lot more to the USA than cities. Some amazing national parks.

want to try and do flights/accommodation as cheap as possible

Flights tend to be more expensive in July and August. Get a feel for cost on Skyscanner, searching UK to USA for cheapest options. Do similar starting with Dublin. Try different months.

any tips for what type of accommodation we should be going for

Accommodation is upto you. Hotels in most major cities will be expensive. Less so hostels or Airbnb type accommodation.

and any other moneysaving tips?

Revolut currency card. Have back up plans in case it fails, even if it's an expensive debit card or credit card.

Make sure you have adequate travel insurance. It's an expensive country to be ill in.

Three SIM only data deals may be good for you.

How much should I take with me?

How long is a piece of string?

Hotels or other accommodation. I'd budget £75 a night for a driving holiday. More for cities. Less in hostels. The occasional suite hotel with laundry facility might come in handy.

Meals. Motels often include a basic sugary breakfast. Restaurant prices are similar to UK. McDonalds or similar usually available - eat whatever is on special offer to save. Fridge and microwave in accommodation may allow you to save money on eating out. Add on 15% for tips in restaurants (not fast food places).

Drinks. I struggled to find cheap bottled drinks in NYC and Washington, often paying more than I'd want for Coke or Water. Stocking up in Walmart or Safeway is worth doing if you've somewhere to store it. Add on a $1 tip for drinks in bars.

Transport. You've not indicated how you're going to get around. Booking a car with flight can save a fortune. But if you're under 25 beware additional insurance costs. And if you're staying in major cities beware huge parking costs in prime locations.

Entertainment. There's a lot of free stuff to see and do. $80 will get you into all the national parks for a year. Equally, you could spend $hundreds in a day doing NYC touristy things.

A bit more information about what you expect from this trip might be helpful.

John259

You can use Google Maps to check where places are and probably more importantly how far away from each other they are. You can also use Google Maps to search for motels, and in StreetView mode you can look round towns, highways and some hiking trails in national parks.
https://maps.google.com

Wikipedia has useful background articles on US regions, states, cities, towns, national parks and even highways.
http://en.wikipedia.org

The US National Park Service web site has lots of practical information about visiting each of the wonderful national parks and the numerous other similar areas that they administer such as the national monuments.
http://www.nps.gov

Each state also has its own state parks, some of which are superb. You can use Google to find the web site for each state's parks.

YouTube has some excellent videos of places, road trips and dashcam videos of highways. (There's also an awful lot of total rubbish on there so it takes some effort to find the good ones.)
http://www.youtube.com

It's probably obvious but FWIW here's a map showing the major US mountain ranges etc:
http://www.freeworldmaps.net/united-states/us-mountain-ranges-map.jpg

Here's a map showing where almost all of the US national parks are located:
http://www.terragalleria.com/parks/info/parks-map.gif

Some passes in the Rocky Mountains and the Sierra Nevada Mountains are closed every year due to snow from around December to May or June. The annual road closure most likely to affect visitors from Britain is the Tioga Pass (CA120) from Yosemite Valley to US395 near Lee Vining.

In summer the southeast is very hot and very humid, whereas the southwest is very hot and very dry which most people cope with better than the humidity.

The budget motel chains such as Motel 6, Super 8 and Red Roof Inns suit me ideally for a road trip where all I need is somewhere clean and safe to sleep. Some people prefer to pay more, of course. Independent family run "mom & pop" motels are often good value in smaller towns.
http://www.motel6.com
http://www.super8.com
https://www.redroof.com

Even fairly small towns in the USA and Canada have "gas, food and lodging" (petrol stations, restaurants and motels) especially if they have an interstate exit. These services tend to be clustered around interstate exits or on the main roads into town, rather than in the actual town centre. So you're not limited to staying in big cities all the time.

Accommodation in national parks is expensive and books up months in advance. However, nearly all the parks have towns fairly close by with motels at lower rates with no need to book in advance.

Two superb loops in the west:

1. Los Angeles > Pacific Coast Highway > San Francisco > Yosemite National Park > via the Tioga Pass and US395 to Death Valley National Park > Las Vegas > Los Angeles (a reminder that the Tioga Pass is closed in winter and spring).

2. The Grand Circle: Las Vegas > Zion National Park > Bryce Canyon NP > Capitol Reef NP > Arches and Canyonlands NP and Dead Horse Point State Park > Monument Valley > Mesa Verde NP, the Durango-Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad (authentic old time western style stream train through the mountains) and the San Juan Skyway loop of highly scenic mountain roads > Grand Canyon NP (south rim) > via AZ66 (part of old Route 66) and Hoover Dam to Las Vegas.

In the East, I'd highly recommend the Appalachian Mountains, i.e. Great Smoky Mountains NP (Tennessee and North Carolina), the Blue Ridge Parkway (North Carolina and Virginia) and Shenandoah National Park (Virginia). That's well over 500 miles of great scenery and interesting roadside exhibits such as pioneer cabins.

Here's some recommended YouTube videos, playlists and creators that you might like to sample:

Traveling Robert (trips by plane, car and RV in the USA and elsewhere):
https://www.youtube.com/user/TravelingRobert

Cheap Family Travel (informative videos made by the children of a US family):
https://www.youtube.com/user/cheapfamilytravel

A British family's California road trip:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLb-8Gy55ZLXaVGaWY3_O_KUo2H5cgmb7P

The Grand Circle around the Grand Canyon in Utah, Colorado and Arizona:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_6z7C5ecTk
(They did some extreme hikes, but nearly all the US national parks also offer easy walking paths and hiking trails.)

A lengthy coast-to-coast road trip:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bmSVpSl4vVs

A dashcam video of the beautiful Big Sur section of the Pacific Coast Highway in California:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypfy7XHjRl4

Videos of each of the 58 US national parks:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLpz7cLJ1_TwSnUf7XGZAQci-c3omf5Ept

A video about the history of the Blue Ridge Parkway in Virginia and North Carolina:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UExeCMJ1RuQ

A truck driver's trip from Montana to California, illustrating various types of US roads, towns, cities and driving situations (and some nice scenery too):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLaXIzbcZgE

ferf1223

remember that sometimes open-jaw flights, where you fly into one city and out of another, can be similar price to a return fare and may offer you some flexibility in your planning. usually they can be searched using a multi-city option on most search engines.

shaun_from_Africa

After you've picked up your hire car, pop into a Walmart, Publix or similar large store and get a cheap cool box. (Walmart do polystyrene ones for about $5) and a bag of ice. Then you can keep it loaded with bottles of water, soft drinks etc so you won't have to pay exorbitant prices when you need a drink.
Many motels and hotels have ice machines so you may not need to pay for this either.

Another tip is to make sure that you have a device of some sort that is wifi enabled. Using this you can generally get free internet access from most restaurant chains and many department stores such as Pennys and Sears.
This comes in handy for getting online to look at hotel and motel availability and prices before you get to an area where you are considering stopping for the night.

If you are up for it, don't forget to try haggling over the quoted price for accommodation, especially if it is mid week and there are no special events in the area that may attract a lot of people.

I will agree with john259 about the cheapie chains of motels.
I've stayed in many Motel6's and Super8's and have only ever had one that I was unhappy with.

callum9999

Sign up to a free membership with USAA if you decide to hire a car. They have a discount code for members that will waive underage fees with several companies - saved me a fortune.

Whether it would be beneficial to have a hire car or not depends on where you're going though. The people above are making wild stabs in the dark - even if you don't know what you want to do or see, you need to specify why you want to go to the US in the first place, how long you'll be spending there and whether you'll be returning again any time soon.

blindman

lyle1993 wrote: »

Flying to USA for a few weeks in the summer, going to try and do 3/4 different cities...want to try and do flights/accommodation as cheap as possible, any tips for what type of accommodation we should be going for and any other moneysaving tips? How much should I take with me?
Thanks

Think you need to add more detail for helpful answers.

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