Road trip from Southern California to Oklahoma

[mommalin]

My daughters and I are going to take a roadtrip this summer (early July) from Southern California to Ardmore, OK for a family wedding. My husband is unable to come and he is usually the one that does all the driving. I am a little apprehensive and would rather fly, but my daughters want to do a road trip. I have NO idea what to do or where to get started in planning.
Would appreciate any help I can get.
Thanks

[AZBuck]

Welcome aboard the RoadTrip America Forums!

The fact is that you simply have not given us enough information to allow us to offer you any meaningful help whatsoever. "Southern California" covers an awful lot of ground and indeed you would travel two completely different routes to Ardmore depending on whether you were leaving from Los Angeles or San Diego. It would also help to know what you, and particularly your daughters, were hoping to get out of the RoadTrip.

AZBuck

[DonnaR57]

Welcome aboard!

"Getting started" can be something as simple as getting out a big USA road map or atlas. There are two schools of thought: choose a route and then see what's along it to see, or choose things to see and make the route work around those. Which you use would really depend on what you hope to get out of the trip.

Off-hand, I'd say you may just go up to I-40 from either LA or San Diego, and head east.





Donna

[mommalin]

Thanks. We are traveling from Chino Hills, which is about 30 miles east of Los Angeles. Since it is a wedding, we have a deadline on the way out to Ardmore, but don't have one on the way home. My daughters would like to stop and see things on the way home (Grand Canyon, etc.) We would probably take I-40 all the way out. I was just trying to figure out how long to plan to get there without being too rushed, since the wedding is on a Saturday.

[DonnaR57]

Getting there without being too rushed: I would say to allow 3 days, if you can drive about 450-500 miles per day. Perhaps Flagstaff (AZ), Tucumcari (NM) and in to Ardmore the third day.


Donna

[Charlie H]

I would agree with Donna that three days to Ardmore would do it - it's 1363 miles via I-40.

There are any number of things to see and do on the way back in addition to the Grand Canyon. The red rock country of the Sedona, Arizona area is magnificient. Monument Valley and the National Parks of Southern Utah - Zion, Bryce Canyon, Arches and Canyonlands are hard to beat.

For the most part, you will be in the Route 66 corridor and Route 66 is a great favorite, especially with Europeans.

If you plan on staying at one of the Grand Canyon lodges, make your reservations as soon as possible. In July, Grand Canyojn will be very busy and lodging fills up quickly.

I think staying at one of the Park Lodges is the best way to go because, as I said, the Canyon will be very busy in July and just finding a place to park can be a serious problem. If you stay at one of the Lodges in the Park, this problem is eliminated.

Have A Great Trip!!

[AZBuck]

The key to having a safe and relaxed long distance RoadTrip is to leave plenty of time both for the drive and for some significant out-of-car time as well. As others have pointed out, you will need a minimum of three days to make the drive to Ardmore safely. The upside of that is those three days can be relatively relaxed since you only need to cover about 450 miles each day. (Note that trying to do it in two 675 mile days is both unsafe and would get you to Ardmore in no mental or physical shape to enjoy the wedding.) So, as Donna has suggested, let's assume that you stay the night in Flagstaff and then Tucumcari. Besides the 'usual' good R&R spots near the highway you would then have time for a somewhat longer stop each day to give the trip a sense of vacation rather than just getting to Point 'B'. On Day 1, there are a couple of possibilities: London Bridge in Lake Havasu City and Walnut Canyon National Monument outside Flagstaff. On Day 2, you have Petrified Forest National Park and Petroglyph National Monument in Albuquerque. And on Day 3, there's Cadillac Ranch outside Amarillo, the Wichita Mountains National Wildlife Refuge, and the Chisolm Trail Museum in Waurika. Note that I am recommending that you leave I-40 at Amarillo and follow US-287/TX-256/US-62/TX-7/US-70 to Ardmore.

On the way back home, when you can take more time (at least 5 days or so) then you can consider visits to the major scenic attractions which are more than a bit off your route such as the Grand Canyon and the sights of southern Utah including Grand Staircase Escalante, Bryce Canyon and Zion.

AZBuck