Driving from San francisco to Vancouver in late august 2020,

[rayboy]

Hi.. we live in Australia and are planning a road trip via San francisco to Vancouver Via Glacier national park .
Obviously need some car hire .
Can anyone recommend or know of a US rental company that do a one way rental
have done so much looking
thanks Ray

[Midwest Michael]

Welcome to the RTA Forum!

While nearly every major car rental car companies do one way rentals, renting a car in the US and dropping it off in Canada is likely going to be a bit of a problem. Most companies will not allow that, or if they do, they will charge a dramatically high extra fee for doing so. Keep in mind, that's on top of the standard one way fee that is common and can be fairly expensive.

If I were you, I'd look at returning the car in Seattle, and then take the bus or train onto Vancouver, if you're planning fly back from Vancouver.

[rayboy]

Hi thanks for that .It does seem to be the case .back to a bit more research on what you have just suggested .

[rayboy]

Hi .
Still in the planning for mid September 2020 .
Intend to drive from San Francisco to glacier national park on to Calgary then to Vancouver and End in Seattle
Question is whats the BEST and most scenic route to Glacier national park ? From SF
Only got rental car for 9 days at moment but that can be changed
Any help would be appreciated .
Have ideas from Google maps .BUT..Any thoughts on Yellowstone .Bit out the way?
This will be our third Road trip in USA
thanks
Ray

Mod note] Please keep all questions regarding this trip here. Thanks.

[Southwest Dave]

Yellowstone isn't too far out the way seeing as you are going to Glacier, it's having the time to actually see the place that may be the problem. Usually you need a good 3 days to see Yellowstone with a drive through Grand Tetons and with a solid 4 days driving it's only going to leave you 2 days for Glacier, Calgary and Vancouver, presuming you already have extra time planned in Seattle. How much more time can you find on the road ? Is starting out in San Fran a must and if so, is Glacier NP a must?

[DonnaR57]

Considering what you've told us, why not just fly in/out of Seattle? One, you can do a round trip in a rental car which would include Yellowstone, Glacier, and Vancouver. That round trip would be a lot cheaper than a one-way drop-off with a rental car. Two, you'd have less time on the road and more time to enjoy the scenery. The only drawback is if you'd picked San Francisco for some reason, you'd miss whatever was there. (It's a city, much like a lot of other cities, though it has a few things to make it stand out from other cities.)


Donna

[rayboy]

Hi .thanks for the reply Reason we are pickup in SF our cruise that we are on finishes there ,have no intention of seeing SF seen it before
One way car rental Is SF to Seattle ,again reason being its cheaper to drop of back in the in the US then can fly home from there Rather than drive back down to SF ...
Would a day be good enough to have a look at Yellowstine ..Is it much like Rotorua in New zealand
What the thoughts then on Glacier NP ..got to basically drive through that are to get up to Canada to do the Rockies Banff etc ..
or do we forget yellowstone and head through Spokane
Thanks again
Ray

[Southwest Dave]

You didn't say by how much time you could extend the 9 day car rental, but another 2 or 3 days could make the difference for you. A lot of it is personal preferences, how long are you happy to drive for on any given day ? Some people are OK with a couple of long driving days (550 miles/10 hours) and some absolutely don't want to drive for more than 3-4 hours on any day. You could get to near Glacier (say Kalispell) in 2 hard days drive from SF but I would allow 4 days minimum if you were to go via Yellowstone, quite a difference with only 9 days total. I think you need to work out what the rest of your trip looks like and see whats left. If you are going all the way to Calgary and Vancouver, how much time do you want to spend there to make it worthwhile and so on. Each trip takes it's own unique path so you need to answer some of these questions yourself based upon what you want from the trip. To be honest if it was me and I knew I had to start from SF and had 9 days on the road, I would take a more relaxed trip to Yellowstone and Glacier NP and leave Canada for a seperate trip. That would give you time to choose some other stops from the likes of Yosemite, Lake Tahoe, Twin Falls(Snake river canyon), Shoshone Falls, Craters of the Moon, the Grand Tetons and Mormon row and Mt Baker for example. Another thing to consider is that the National parks will be heaving with people in late August and personally I wouldn't go near Yellowstone just for a drive through, for me it just wouldn't be worth the hassel and it will be SLOW !

An afterthought. Would flying from SF to Seattle and then doing a circular tour of your wishlist from there be worth considering ? It would add the cost of flights but would save one way drop off fees and some fuel towards the cost.

[DonnaR57]

Yellowstone is HUGE, and as Dave said, traffic is always slow. First there's the 30 mph speed limit, then there are animal-jams (where everyone stops to have a look-see at a bison, bear, or whatever), and the cars that queue up just to get into a scenic pull-out parking area. That's just driving through.

There are a half dozen major thermal areas, each one with board walks to walk through these areas. You can spend 10 minutes or you can spend a day just roaming each of the thermal areas. Old Faithful, of course, is the most regular one and the most popular. The parking lot for that (plus two inns and a Visitor Center) is huge. In September, it shouldn't fill, but it could. Old Faithful is regular, but can still be hard to time your arrival so that you watch it explode. If you get there right after it's gone off, you'll be waiting 50-75 minutes for it to explode next.

Did I say the park is huge? In 2014, we took basically 3-1/2 days in Yellowstone and Grand Teton. The first day, basically a half day, was driving into the park from Billings/Red Lodge over Beartooth Pass. We were able to stop and see the vast lands of the NE section of the park, which included buffalo at a distance. The next day, we did the lower half of the loop, but we missed an entire thermal region (including Grand Prismatic). The third day, we did the upper half of the figure 8 loop, plus driving up to Gardiner to see the Roosevelt Arch. On the fourth full day, we went to Grand Teton and moved on to a different overnight. We decided that day that we would come back and spend more time in Yellowstone, to be able to do a hike or two that was not on a board walk.


Donna

[Lifemagician]

Would a day be good enough to have a look at Yellowstine ..Is it much like Rotorua in New zealand Ray

Ray, if you are going to be in the area, Yellowstone is ALWAYS worth a visit, even if it is only a drive through. It will be slow and probably take several hours. Check the Yellowstone map on the website and choose a route which will include at least one major attraction. If you've been to Rotorua you'll probably pick something other than Old Faithful. You never know what other opportunities you will get in the future.

My first three visits to Yellowstone were only drive throughs with a brief stop at a major attraction. They were so worthwhile the slight detour.

Lifey