NYC to San Diego... Help please!!

[honesnbones]

I'm moving this summer from NYC to San Diego and wanted to make a road trip out of it. I was thinking about driving from NYC to Denver, stopping along the way at Philly, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Chicago, St. Louis, and then Denver (i.e. all baseball towns :-), where I'd like to have my car shipped the rest of the way to SD while I fly/train it the rest of the way there.
I've never done this sort of thing before and to be honest, am quite nervous. This will be my first time leaving New York.
1) Can this be done? I.e. can I get a company to ship my car from Denver, or thereabouts, to San Diego? Any recommendations?
2) How much time should I allow for this? I like driving to a certain extent, but don't know if I could do more than 200 - 300 miles a day, as I don't want to (a) fall asleep at the wheel & (b) see some of the sights along the way. I was hoping to do this in ~ 1 week. Is that possible?
3) Any website you'd recommend in terms of matching my itinerary with baseball games, sites in different cities at different times of the year?
4) How much should something like this cost?

Any help would be much appreciated.

Thanks,
Aryeh

[michigancamper]

I know years ago my old boss had his daughters Jeep trucked to LA when she had moved out there. Others may have more information but I would imagine any large city would have a firm that can truck it out there for you. Seems like it was a car carrier with less than a full load headed to LA that it was on.

Good luck and congrats on your move to San Diego!

[DonnaR57]

Welcome to RTA!

The trip is 3000 miles one way. Driving the whole way at 300 miles a day will make it a 10 day trip. Driving to Denver (about 2000 miles) in a week would be possible, but your car will take considerably longer to have it shipped.

Chances of you being able to catch a ball game in each of those cities is pretty slim, though you should be able to catch one (I'd imagine!).

As for cost: estimate $50-75 per night for motel, about $15-30/day for food per person, and use the fuel cost estimator on this site to figure out how much your gas will cost. For shipping your car, you might have to get some quotes. The last time we had a car shipped, the Navy paid for it (from Adak, AK, about 22 years ago). Hopefully someone else will be able to chime in about the costs of ball games....not my cup-a-tea.


Donna

[Midwest Michael]

Welcome to the RTA Forum!

I've got to say that if you're driving as far as Denver, you might as well finish the drive. Shipping would be very expensive, you've already made 2/3 of the drive at that point. From Denver, you could easily finish the drive in 2 long days. You probably could ship it, but I wouldn't think it would be worth your time or money.

200-300 miles is a very easy day on the road, and if that's all you're doing, then doing this trip in a week would be a little tough. Its about 2000 miles just to Denver, so you'd have to be on the top end of that to make it possible.

The bigger thing is that we typically suggest that 500-600 miles is a full day on the road, which works out to 8-10 hours. Of course, you have to figure out what works for you, but that an idea of what you might be able to do. At 500 miles, you've got time to at least see a few things, but it is still mostly a driving day.

For baseball, I just look at mlb.com and/or the team sites to compare home games with my travel dates.

[Southwest Dave]

It would also be a shame to have to ship the car from Denver, as the possible routes from there to SD can be extremely scenic with Lot's of attractions. If you could find a little extra time you could have a wonderful time, and not having to pay for shipping the car will offset quite a bit of cost.

If driving the whole way isn't an option you are comfortable with, personally I would consider having it shipped to Denver and then drive the rest of the way !