vegas to san fran in the summer for first time

[Geoff]

My wife and I will be in vegas at the start of August and will have 11 nights to make the journey one way from vegas to san fran in a hire care stopping in hotels/motels etc en route. We want to see a mixture of sights. Defintely want to see some of the coast, pacific highway etc. but also a park/lake, desert, mountains etc. The thing I finding hard is to geta route which includes both some of the best bits of the coast but with some of the inland bits as well. What would be a good route and where would be cross over?

Also we don't want to be in a different place each night and would prefer a longer drive and then stop 2 or 3 nights in one place. Finally can anyone suggest a rough typical overnight charge for hotel/motels at that time of year.

All idea gratefully taken!

Cheers

Geoff

[Southwest Dave]

Hello and welcome to the RTA forums !

With 11 days you have many options and you will find lots of info on the area here. To get a mix of landscapes you could travel across the desert landscape of Death valley and head North on 395 to Lee vining/ Mono lake and head into Yosemite on CA120 [Tioga pass] and then perhaps visit Sequoia NP before heading across to the coast and up towards SF on the PCH.

The Grand canyon is also a possibility and could be included in a few ways, either straight there via the Hoover dam and I 40 or you could head into Southern Utah and Zion NP by heading North from Vegas on I 15 and then dropping down through Page after Zion to the South rim of Grand canyon. There are many other options such as Lake Tahoe as well so have a look around the RTA pages and when you have found a trip to suit you let us know and we can help to "fine tune" it.

Enjoy the planning !