Five Weeks, East to West Coast and Back

Hello,

I've been browsing the message boards for a while learning so much for my upcoming trip this summer. My husband and I are teachers and our prerequisite before starting a family is a cross-country trip, so here it goes! We will be gone July21-Aug26 in my Corolla with a tent, an air mattress, two sleeping bags, a cooler, and a camping stove!

I'm looking for any advice about places to see, and if our time limits seem reasonable. We don't have a lot of have-to's right now for our trip, which is the way we wanted it, if something looks fun we want the time to go and see it. But I am still looking for options of routes and things to see. Here is a VERY loose plan of what we will be doing this summer:

July 21- Leave Boston- Spend two nights in Rochester, NY with friends-see Niagra Falls

July 23- Leave for Cleveland, OH- spend two nights- Red Sox game against the Indians planned for the 24th! We're thinking of going to the Rock n' Roll Hall of Fame, anything else cool to see?

July 25- Leave Cleveland to see Middletown and Lancaster (?) Ohio, family stuff!

July 26th- Aug3rd- Is unplanned- We need to be in Seattle by Aug 3rd for a Red Sox Game we have tickets for. We were thinking of going north through Chicago, Minnesota, South Dakota, Wyoming (Yellowstone, would love to see Grand Teton)- I have a friend in Denver I would love to see for a couple of days, but don't know if this would be a better visit on our way out west or coming back home. Any advice here would be helpful!

August 3-5- Seattle- Red Sox game, and I want to see Mt. Rainier. This is my "it" place for our trip, I've always wanted to see Seattle- any other suggestions on what to see here?

August 5-10 (probably give a day or two)- Driving down the west coast stopping along the way in Oregon and California- our end destination here is Riverside, CA to visit with family for a couple of days. We are looking for any info on what is great to see in Oregon- will do the Redwoods in CA, want to do a winery tour.

In giving time to see things on our way home, we may leave CA on or around August 14th? That gives us 12 days to travel home back to Massachusetts. We want to go to Death Valley, Las Vegas, Grand Canyon, maybe Bryce Canyon, Memphis TN, then up the east coast back home. I think we have enough time to see what we want, but then again we have no idea, the country is so huge!

Any advice at all is helpful, thanks! Kate

Welcome aboard the RoadTrip America Forums!

Sounds like the perfect recipe for a wonderful vacation: Over a month on the road and no particular place to go! Without loading you down with a lot of pre-planned items to add to your itinerary, then, let me just point out a few (and I do mean a few) of the many options that will be available to you as you go along.

As you get started, a couple of great nature parks you should consider to get yourself in the mood for the rest of your trip are Letchworth State Park southwest of Rochester and Cuyahoga Valley National Park south of Cleveland. You can also get a quick soul refresher at Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore before tackling the gauntlet that is getting around Chicago on the Tri-State Tollway (I-294). Here's a report on one RoadTripper'sjourney through South Dakota for some ideas there. As you travel across southern Montana be sure to stop at Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument and use the Beartooth Highway for a dramatic entrance into Yellowstone. Judy is our resident Pacific Northwest expert, so I suggest you use the Search function and look for her posts on that area. Her's just one example of what she has had to offer. Similarly, the Pacific Coast Highway has been the subject of more posts than I care to count. The best advice I can give you is to poke around the threads a bit searching for terms like 'redwoods', 'Oregon coast' and the like. Everything you've listed as spots to stop on the way back is well within reach. To fill in the blanks, get a good road atlas and go over it with your husband. See what appeals for major stops, connect the dots, and then see what little treasures (and there will be plenty) lie along your general route. We can always help fill in the blanks once you have a better idea of where you're going and we have a better idea of what you're looking for.

AZBuck