New York to Portland

[BenNZ]

Hi my wife and I are planning to come to America in June 2017 for a road trip from NY to OR, we are going to have about 21 days.
We are from New Zealand and have never been stateside before so we are doing some research on what to expect. We enjoy the smaller cities and towns being from a small rural town ourselves, but we want to see a few of the landmarks that are well known worldwide.
We have drafted a itinerary some places are just a stab in the dark on a map between destinations so I thought I'd post our plan and if anyone wanted to offer any advice that would be great.

Day 1
Arrive in New York City

Day 2
Explore New York City

Day 3
New York to Utica - this is the first stab in the dark

Day 4
Utica to Niagara Falls

Day 5
Niagara Falls to Lorain OH

Day 6
Lorain to Chicago

Day 7
Explore Chicago

Day 8
Chicago to Cedar Rapids

Day 9
Cedar Rapids to Sioux city

Day 10
Sioux City to Oacoma

Day 11
Oacoma to Rapid city

Day 12
Rapid city to Gillette via Mt Rushmore

Day 13
Gillette to Cody

Day 14
Cody to Yellowstone national park

Day 15
Explore Yellowstone

Day 16
Yellowstone to Missoula

Day 17
Missoula to Coeur d'alene

Day 18
Coeur d'alene to Seattle

Day 19
Explore Seattle

Day 20
Seattle to Portland

Day 21
Fly home


Thanks for your help,
Ben

[Lifemagician]

Hi and Welcome to the Great American Roadtrip Forum.

Great trip which will take you to and near many great landmarks - historical and natural as well as touristy. But you will want to know where they all are.

Do you have some good detailed maps? If you are not able to get them locally, it would pay you to get a Rand McNally road atlas from the RTA store. You will have it in a couple of weeks. These maps have a wealth of information. They show the scenic routes and the old US highways, as well as the interstate freeways/tollways.

If you are a member of your local AA be sure to bring your membership with you. It will give you access to free maps and tourist information from the AAA anywhere in the US. You could pick up all the maps of the States you plan to travel whilst in NYC. I would also pick up a good detailed map of Chicago, and any other major urban centre you plan to visit.

Since this trip is not for a couple of years, be sure to get onto the Yellowstone website many months before you travel to book accommodation within the park. This is not essential, but highly desirable. Yellowstone has a very short season, accommodation is limited and much sought after. Sometimes in Jan it can be too late for accommodation in July.

You will not want to have a car in NYC, so pick up a rental as you leave. I have heard that it is much cheaper to rent in NJ than in NY. As it is you will be hit with a hefty one way fee for picking up a car on the east coast and dropping it on the west coast.

When you get the road atlast, be sure to spend a bit of time studying to see what there is along the way that interests you. Once you have some dots on the map the experts here will help you refine the route and help fill in the blanks.

One other thing which you may find useful is to see if you can get hold of a National Geographic Map of the USA. If there is not one available locally, you may be able to get it from Mapworld. I particularly like the large one for all the information it has, but I see they are sold out. Not sure if they will be in stock again.

Enjoy the planning, it is so much part of the trip. Try to keep a little flexibility, so you can explore unexpected gems along the way.

Lifey