San Francisco East Bay to Portland.

Hi,

Me and my girlfriend are planning a trip to Portland, OR from SF. We would like to get some advise about our road trip. We were thinking about leaving on Thursday after 6:00PM staying in Sacramento and start driving Friday Morning for Crater lake and then finally Portland. I would appreciate some good suggestions cause I dont know if the route that we are choosing will be that good. I would like to drive 4 hours on Thursday and get to a good spot and then drive only for 6-7 hours to Portland on Friday.
Any suggestions on what to do in portland? We will be there Friday night, Saturday all and leave on Sunday.We are in our mid 20's, hope that helps. Also any recommendation for our ride back? We will be coming back on Sunday.
I would really appreciate your response.

Thanks

Mitul.

Welcome to the RTA Forum!

I'm not entirely sure I'm following your plan, as it would seem things aren't adding up at all.

On one hand, You say you're thinking of driving to Sacramento, then driving up to Crater Lake and Portland. On the other you say you want to drive 4 hours on Thursday.

Sacramento is less than 100 miles from San Francisco, certainly no where near 4 hours away from SF, and would leave a drive of much more than 6-7 hours the next day.

If you're looking to be about 4 hours from SF, then I'd say Redding would be about right.

However, I have to warn that even there, you're still more than 7 hours from Portland, if you stick to I-5. From Redding to Portland via Crater Lake, you're likely looking at something more like 9-10 hours.

From anywhere in the East Bay, you would take I80 to I505 in Vacaville, take that North to where it merges back into I5. Cuts miles off the route north. Not sure where you're starting from but either Oakland or Concord to Redding is 3.5 to 4 hours. If you actually go all the way to Sacto before heading north on I5 add another half hour.

Weed/Shasta/Dunsmuir if you want to push it another hour.

From Weed through the south entry to Crater Lake and out the north entrance to Portland, without stops for food or sightseeing, is going to be at least 8 hours... so while feasible this will be a rushed day.

Of course, if you're leaving THIS Thursday (today), this is probably too late to be of much help.

While in Portland: beer, Powell's books, beer, Voodoo Donuts, beer. Not necessarily in that order.