Great American road trip planning for a non-american.

[proxycon]

Hello All,
I have always been fascinated by the stories of solo cross country travelers in USA. I am an IT professional from India who came to US in Feb, 2011. Since then I have made many small and one medium road trips with my friends. I will be going back to my home country by July, 2013 end. Before that, suddenly I am realizing that I so much want to do a solo road trip across this great country with so much varied landscape.

I want to take few days off around 4th of July and plan an 8 or 9 days road trip from Houston to Seattle. This will be one way solo road trip. I can fly from Seattle to Houston after I reach there. Or, should I do other way round? Do you suggest if I should do this or not. None of my friends have done solo road trips. I will be taking a rental vehicle and I am very good at planning. My hobbies include - Building gaming PCs, Driving, Movies.

I recently drove from Houston - Santa Fe, NM - Houston 2300 miles with 5 of my friends. I have visited Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Yosemite NP, PCH drive, San Francisco, New York, Miami, Tampa, Dallas, Austin, San Antonio, Grand Canyon, Smokeys by flying to those places.

Also, any itineraries wlecome! Thanks!

[Midwest Michael]

Welcome to the RTA Forum!

Your itinerary is going to depend upon what you want to see - and only you can answer than by at least starting with the few "musts" for you that would be between Houston and Seattle.

Just driving, you're looking at about a 5 day trip, so 8-9 days gives you enough time to comfortably make the trip with time to stop and see some things, but not time to spend really explore any one place.

The only difference I can think of in starting in Houston vs. Seattle is price. Renting a car one way is going to be quite expensive, but it might be cheaper to start in one vs. the other. Airfare might also be cheaper one direction vs. the other. I'd price out starting the trip, with both air and car rental costs, from Houston and Seattle, and go with the direction that is cheapest.

[proxycon]

Thanks for positive reply!

You are right I should take into account the origin location and cost of traveling from there. Although cost is not a factor here, but still saving a few bucks wouldn't hurt I guess.
Places I want to see is - Colorado Million Dollar highway drive, Mount Rushmore, South Dakota golden fields, Glacier NP, Yellowstone NP, Olympic NP, Zion NP. But I don't know which itinerary to follow.

Probably, I should do some more research to figure out where all I want to go :)..