Vancouver BC to Ajax, Ontario thru US to avoid snow & ice SOLO DRIVER 1st time

Hello. I am pleased to discover this site. I think I have tripped over a place where I will get good advice from experienced driver road trippers. My parents are age 91 (both) and I would like to try driving (START) from Vancouver, BC south a ways to avoid snow and ice conditions. (END) to end up in Ajax, Ontario east of Toronto.
DEPARTURE: 2nd week of November
ARRIVAL: When I have spent about $1200 to $1800 on gas, accom and food. Perhaps best to allow $200/day = $2000 approx.

RETURN: Not known. I may become a road trip maven. I want to drive through the US.

I am retired. I plan to take my time. I get leg cramps so walking and hiking are necessary to do each day.

I plan to sleep in a bed, not a tent, each night. Recommendations for motels etc are appreciated but I will not be sticking to a schedule that exceeds 5 hours of driving per day.

I suppose we are looking at a 10 day road trip???

I would like to drive one day for maybe 2 hour drive, 1 hour rest, 2 hour drive... for maximum of 5 to 6 hours.

I would enjoy days off: full day to explore a city, town, park. Maybe the best approach is to pick 3 - 4 major places to visit and then plan the trip around those places. Grand Canyon; Yellowstone; ????

I plan to see some sights. I do not know what sights there are along my route possibilities. Pardon my ignorance. Steer me along!

I have not travelled in the US since I was age 21 - 24 (now age 62) except for some cross border sports events. Never driven the I-5.
I have driven the entire hwy 401 across Canada about 10 years ago so I have some comfort level on up to 4 lane highways.

Probably many people have asked for cross-US west to east AND BACK AGAIN routes.
If you could share that post or routes with me, I'd be immensely grateful.

I am driving a 340HP sport sedan so it is low to ground (designed for performance driving, not off-road gravel back roads - unfortunately) and quick when needed. I will not get run over in the slow lane. LOL.

Should I buy winter tires? I suppose it is a good precaution as I'll need them in Ontario and in BC.

I need to know about State driving laws and State border crossings if there are peculiarities different from Canada and Washington State.

Anna Perry

Welcome to the RTA Forum!

You've got a lot of things going on in your post, some of them seem to contradict each other.

You talk about driving no more than 5 hours a day, which is perfectly fine.

You also talk about planning on this taking 10 days, which is possible, but pretty much the minimum amount of time you'd need, sticking to the shortest route and driving 5 hours a day for each of those 10 days. (You'll cover 250-300 miles a day, and you're looking at a 2750 mile trip on the shortest route)

Then you also talk about going south to avoid snow (bad idea, more on that later), planning your trip around 3-4 places, and even list places like the Grand Canyon in Arizona as places you're considering visiting. If you went to the Grand Canyon, just as an example, that adds another 1000 miles and 4 days to your trip (with your 5 hour/day goal). If you've got 2-3 weeks for this trip, then that's great, but if for time/money reasons you want to keep this to 10 days, then that's not really going to work.

As noted, one of the biggest myths of winter travel is that going south will help you avoid bad weather, when in fact it can be quite the opposite. First going south means more miles, thus more time on the road and more chances you have to see snow/ice. Second, those extra miles often are though areas that see plenty of winter weather (for example, driving south to California first means going through the mountains in Oregon that frequently see snow), Third, you can't go far enough south to avoid bad weather - every cross country route in the US, including I-10 near the Mexican border) sees snow and ice every year. Finally, if you see bad weather in the south, it's often ice instead of snow (which is far more difficult to drive on) and the road crews don't have the plows/salt/ability to deal with the bad weather and thus they just wait for it to melt.

The best thing you can do if you're concerned about snow is to stick to a more or less direct route, and be flexible enough to slow down or even stop for a day if you do encounter a storm, to give the road crews time to do their thing and restore the roads to good driving conditions.

Snow tires wouldn't be a bad idea, especially since you'd get use out of them in Ontario, but if you have good all season tires it wouldn't be essential.

Driving in the US isn't significantly different than driving in Canada. Other than getting used to seeing miles instead of km and some other small differences in signage and the like, the rules of the road are generally the same.