First time trip - 2-2.5 weeks to see as much as possible

So, me and my two friends had this grand plan after college graduation to go to Europe. We were all excited and making plans, and just finally had to realize that it was going to be too damn expensive. So, we have decided to do a round-trip cross country trip instead. Yet, we are pretty clueless on where to start. Ideally, we would love to start in San Diego and travel along the south seeing Las Vegas, Grand Canyon, Texas, Lousiana and Georgia while continuing up the east coast and spending time in NY, boston, rhode island, new jersey and washington, dc. Then we would like to continue back west through illinois and come through denver back to san diego. I know this is ambitious for the time period (2 to 2.5 weeks). Is it ridiculous? I know we could make it in that time, but I want to be able to have fun in places and not feel rushed. Also, we would love to spend a couple days in both vegas and NY. Thoughts on time and best destinations would be much appreciated. THanks!

Welcome to the RTA forum!

I'm sorry to tell you that there simply isn't going to be a way to do everything you want under the timeline you'd like.

Yes, you might be able to physically drive to each of the places in 2-2.5 weeks, but you would very much be rushed, and you certainly wouldn't have time to spend time in any of the places you've listed.

I'll let you start by just keeping some basic things in mind. Even at a quick pace (8-10 hours per day) it takes a good 5 days to make it cross country one way. That's also using a fairly direct route, if you take a longer route, say through Georgia and then up the east coast, it will take even more time. So if you've only got 2-2.5 weeks, you won't have a whole lot of time for relaxing on a cross country tip. But Ultimately, it will be up to you to decide how much sightseeing you want to do and how much time you want to be behind the wheel during your trip.

One way to keep costs down is to start where you are - meaning, do you have to fly somewhere to get close to any of these destinations? I know you said you'd love to start in San Diego - is that actually where you are closest to or live? If that's the case, I would stick to the West and save the East for another time when you are able to either (ideally) spend more time on the road or budget to fly out this way and then get a rental and explore.