Solo Traveller from the UK, looking for tips and advice for 2 month Road Trip

[ABurrington]

Hi Everyone,


I am a solo traveller who is coming form the UK to the USA at the end of August to travel the country for two months. I'm flying into Boston and flying out of Los Angeles and want to see as much as I can!!

I want to be in Seattle by 1st October where I am meeting my girlfriend. The 5 weeks before that are virtually completely open! I've thought about a rough route; I don't want anything too planned or structured but after reading a lot of the threads on here I though it best to at least have something in mind. My (vague) itinerary would be as follows;

Boston and surrounding area
New York City
Washington DC
Blue Ridge Parkway through Virginia and North Carolina, ending up in Great Smokey NP
Ashville, NC
Atlanta and Athens, GA
New Orleans, LA
Houston, TX
Austin, TX
Dallas, TX
Great River Road up to Memphis
Nashville
Chicago

Then from Chicago, I would probably fly to Seattle depending on people's thoughts of timing or how quickly I could make it driving across the plains and mountains!

Regarding the above, is this realistic in 5 weeks? I'd like to have a night or two in each place with more in the obvious places (NYC, DC, Austin etc). I realise many of the distances between each place are huge and have yet to decide on stopover points but definitely realise they are required. Recommendations would be very welcome!! I think I need to aim to keep my distances to around 500 miles on driving days.

You may have guessed from some of the destinations that I'm into music, especially blues. I also love scenic drives; I drove the Route 1 from San Fran to LA and it was one of the best experiences of my life so a repeat of anything close to that would be amazing. Please recommend any scenic drives, even if it means taking a day or two to do them. I'm more than happy to take the long way round!

The West Coast is pretty sown up in terms of planning but any recommendations would be great as well!

So basically - I would love your thoughts on whether the above is realistic. Are there any glaring omissions that I have foolishly left out? Things I should skip? Great places to stay (although I'll be using hostels and camping wherever possible!)?.

Thanks in advance guys!


Alex

[glc]

Welcome!

One point you need to consider - any time you rent a car in one city and drop it off in another, you will pay a significant "one way" dropoff surcharge. Also, if you are under 25, you will pay a daily "young driver" surcharge. That, along with the cost of internal flights, may make it more feasible to keep one car from the beginning to the end of your trip.

5 weeks is very realistic for a cross-country trip.

[Midwest Michael]

Your trip is certainly possible in 5 weeks, although what does stand out to me is that you are focusing almost exclusively on cities. You do have a couple of places like the Blue Ridge and the Great River Road, but that's a pretty small part of your outline.

If you found the Pacific Coast Highway to be one of the best experiences of your life, I'd think you'd jump at the chance to explore some of the many other amazing natural wonders in the western half of the US.

For example, from Chicago, you could head out to South Dakota to the Badlands and Black Hills, onto Yellowstone (via the Beartooth Highway), and even head up to Glacier onto Seattle.

Of course, there are lots of other options for national parks and fantastic scenic drives in the west, especially in places like Colorado and Utah, that are worthy of your consideration. There are lots of options, and pretty much all of them are possible if you've got more than a month to drive from coast to coast.