Philly to Ca and back

I am taking my first big road trip alone in late August. I have 3 weeks and wanted to try to make it from Philadelphia to California and back.

My feeling is that this trip can be split up into 3 parts 1)going from philly to california 2)going from san francisco to LA to san diego 3)going from california back to philly

My plan is to take major interstates on the way to CA and spend about a week going through the state. This would leave me with about a week or a week and a half to go from california back to philly, hopefully taking two lane highways and seeing some sights.

My question is, does this sound reasonable? Does anyone have any alternative suggestions?

Thanks a lot of any help -Justin

Sounds reasonable to me.

thanks for the assurance.

can anyone estimate the shortest amount of time it would take me to go from philly to california? i'm probably going to take the interstates and drive pretty much all day. a friend of mine said 4 days. any suggestions on cities/places i should stop on those nights?

justin

It can be done in 4 days. Roughly, stops fall in Indianapolis, Tulsa/Oklahoma City, Albuquerque (at least) or Gallup (better), and then LA in one last long day. You might want to cut the fourth day a bit short, get up late the next day (Day 5) and cruise into LA AFTER rush hour (no earlier than 10:00 AM). You might find the I-70/I-15 route a bit shorter, and it is also a great route for this trip (the one I suggested is I-44/I-40.

Thanks for those suggestions
I think I might end up taking I-70. I-15 goes South and ends up in Los Angeles. Any suggestions if I wanted to end up in San Francisco first?

Taking I-15 north and then I-80 makes me backtrack a bit. Ever taken I-70 to Route 191 to Route 6 in Utah? Those two roughly lead to I-80.
Justin

Your suggestion for US191 and US6 to get to I-80 would work -- they're both good roads -- but another option is skipping I-80 and take I-70 to US50 and follow that across to California. It's not that much slower than interstate, because in the far west there aren't as many towns to slow you down on two-lane roads. Given that it is a more direct route, I wouldn't be surprised if US50 is even a faster route, at least across Nevada. You could pick up I-80 for the last miles either in the Reno area or Sacramento.