Toronto to Los Angeles - March/April

Hey RTA, I'm new here but I was hoping to get some feedback/tips/ideas on the trip, as I've started to plan recently and wanted to make it as smooth and enjoyable of a trip as possible! I'll be travelling with a small group of friends, probably 4-5 including myself.

Has anyone traveled this distance before? If so, are there any "must visit" places along the way anyone could recommend? I'm usually a "wing it" type of person and just take things as it comes, but I think i'd like to keep things in mind this time around :).

What I had originally quickly planned was to take our time heading to LA (maybe a little under a week?), spend another 5ish days in LA, and then drive straight back home for the remaining (2 days?). This would mean maybe 2 weeks off for the entire trip?

What are your thoughts RTA? Thanks!

Welcome to the RTA Forum!

You're really going to have to start by taking another look at just how far of a distance you are looking at covering.

You basically need 5 full days to get from Toronto to LA at a near speed run clip - that's traveling 10+ hours a day leaving just a little extra time to stop and see a couple things along the way.

Doing this trip in anything under 4 days one way would be reckless to the point of homicidal (and your two day suggestion isn't even possible if you drove non-stop without sleep which is way beyond unreasonable).

As far as what to see, there's really no such thing as a must see - just millions of possiblities depending upon your interest. We can't even start to narrow them down, but once you've got a few idea of the major places you're interested in seeing, then we can help you fill in the gaps.

But really, your first step is to come up with a more realistic timeframe. If all you want to do is sprint out to LA, spend a couple days there, and then sprint back then you could do this in 2 weeks, but if you want really see anything beyond what's right off the freeway, you should be looking at a good 3 week trip.

Thanks for the reply Michael! I suppose I may have under-looked the distance we'll be covering. I had it in my mind that since I would be travelling with others, we'd be put on driving shifts, to minimize down time, while only stopping for full night's sleep at major destinations.

Regardless, I think taking 3 weeks would actually be a smarter idea, as it wouldn't be a rushed trip and we could take our time.

I think these were the rough idea of stops/points of interest: Google Maps, taking full sleep breaks at B, D, E, G, (maybe H).

Utah and Colorado seem to have the best sights to see in terms of national parks, and attractions. In terms of on the way through Iowa and Nebraska, it would be nice to maybe travel through the nicest/scenic route? I was reading something about the Heritage Highway in Nebraska being a great scenic route.. In all, I think the main goal is just to get to LA, but take our time on the way to see a few things, and take in the sights along the way.

Going back from LA to TO, was planned to be a sprint back from possibly Las Vegas if we don't to plan to stop by on the way to LA prior. This would be with no full sleep breaks and just switching drivers every X amount of hours/sleeping in the car and only washroom/food/stretch breaks.

I suppose main things to see would be mostly sights/attractions, maybe famous restaurants anyone can recommend haha? We're Canadians so we're not to knowledgeable on popular destinations in each state :D

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Going back from LA to TO, was planned to be a sprint back from possibly Las Vegas if we don't to plan to stop by on the way to LA prior. This would be with no full sleep breaks and just switching drivers every X amount of hours/sleeping in the car and only washroom/food/stretch breaks.

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Don't even try it. Trust us. Allow 4 days for a "sprint". That would apply equally from LA or LV. There is no way anyone can get any kind of meaningful rest in a moving car for well over 2000 miles.

Sleep is not an optional thing on a roadtrip. 4-5 people sitting upright in a car is not real rest - even if you get in a short nap. Simply sitting in a car for hours at a time is physically draining. Even with multiple drivers, after about 600 miles on the road you need to stop and take a full break away from the road. That's not something that can be solved just by switching drivers and stretching for a few minutes.

I can't say this strongly enough, if you try to drive non-stop from Vegas to Toronto you are making a statement loud and clear that you don't care if you kill someone on the highway.

Its russian roulette with 5 bullets in the chamber, and quite frankly could be more dangerous that trying to make such a drive drunk.