How Does One Plan A Road Trip?

[Kate Evans]

So my 2 of my friends and I are wanting to plan a major road trip for the end of August. Any tips that ANYONE could give me would be really helpful. The plan would be to leave Connecticut and head west, hitting Chicago, and then heading south to Oklahoma, New Mexico, Arizona, and finally California. My question is this... the only two cars we have are '91 and '92 Toyota corollas (mine with 193,000 and my friends with 125,000). Is there any way these cars could make it? Also, camping out was our plan... are there enough campsites or national parks with campsites along the way that we could avoid motels for the most part? Thanks for any help you could give me!

[Bob Miller]

My ole caprice has 240,XXX on it and I am planning on a trip to Fla in a couple of weeks. The thing is that you need to make sure that everything is in as best shape as you can get it. If you have no normal problems now, then chances are that you will have none on the road. Just watch the gauges just in case!!

[Lew Bond]

I did a 4 month, 15,000 mile roadtrip in 2001, circumnavigating the lower 48 and staying almost exclusively in Federal and State campgrounds. I used a '97 RAV 4 and a Kompact Kamp pop-up camper. If you get a Golden Eagle Pass, then all Federal Parks and camps are free entry and campsites are 50% off, or about $6/night. State parks are more numerous, but a little more expensive. On the other hand they usually have better facilities, like hot showers, electricity, laundries and flush toilets.

I would take the two cars to a local garage, lay on a story, and have them evaluate them, based on general condition, oil consumption, compression, running gear condition, etc. Shouldn't cost much, maybe nothing. Maybe make a deal to have the winner tuned and serviced for the trip.