Family trip to the East Coast

[wendymae]

We are trying to plan a trip to the East going traveling by RV. We are going to be leaving from Green Bay, WI and want to tour the Eastern seacoast (and in between) but don't even know where to start. Since we will be traveling by RV, I think, we need to keep in mind stops for us along the way for nights. Can anyone help and give some great family trip ideas???

[Midwest Michael]

Welcome to the RTA forum!

I think you're going to have to narrow things down a bit? Are you planning to tour the entire east coast from Maine (or even Canada) to Florida or are you just thinking a section of the east coast? A RV will not really be the ideal form of transportation if you are planning to tour places like Boston, NYC, or Washington.

We'd also need to know a lot more about you and your trip. How much time do you have, who makes up your family, what kinds of things are you interested in.

Basically, to start, you need to figure out the basic idea of what you want to do and what is a must see/do for your family. Once that step is down, you can work to figure out the specifics of how to do it, as well as find things to fill in the gaps between those "musts" for you.

[wendymae]

I guess narrowing down would help. I just feel really overwhelmed with trying to figure this out. At this point, we are thinking the upper Eastern states, although Boston was definitely a consideration, as is Niagara Falls, Maine and maybe Hershey, PA? We're not really thinking of traveling up into Canada because no one has passports. We were thinking an RV, because there is 9 of us going and figured it would be easier to travel as a group, but that brings up needing locations for RV's to park.

[glc]

You also may have a hard time finding a RV that will sleep 9 and transport them safely. There has to be seats with seat belts for each occupant. Cruise America's largest 30' cabover RV can only handle 7, so you would probably need a class "A" motorcoach (like a bus). The northeastern cities would be a real pain with one of those.

[Southwest Dave]

As glc mentioned, everyone who travels has to be buckled up while moving by law, and I don't know of an RV that would do that. A class 'A' RV typically sleeps less than a large class 'C', as it does not have the bunk arrangement above the Cab area.

The idea of one RV travelling as a group, I don't believe is an option.

[AZBuck]

As a young boy, I often did the trip in reverse, visiting my uncle, aunt, and cousins in Green Bay (One of those cousins is today a city councilman.) so I'm fairly familiar with the terrain you're going to be covering. While it would be easy to drive nearly all of it and never leave the Interstates and basically just travel city to city, it is also possible to have a relaxed RoadTrip adventure where you're seeing a good bit of nature - which I take to be a priority from your list of things you'd like to see.

So first some basic tips that you can use in this case and any future planning. Probably the most important bit of advance knowledge you need, and is how many miles one can safely and enjoyably drive in a day. As a rule of thumb, I generally use the following: 550 miles on a day devoted entirely to driving (but I do take the occasional mental health break for short walks during the day); 400 miles if I'm going to be making a couple of 'quick' tourist type stops at monuments, scenic sites, small museums; 250 miles if I have a major half-day stop planned; and 100 miles if I plan to spend most of a day somewhere, but still will do some minimal driving in the morning and evening. Those numbers need to be adjusted by your best guesstimate of traffic delays, weather difficulties and the like. In the later category are two items that you will have working against you: driving an inherently slower vehicle such as towing a trailer or driving a moving van or RV, and driving with many people or in a convoy of vehicles. You can knock 50 miles or so off your expected daily totals for any of those, but they're not all cumulative.

Next, consider that no matter where you're going there is more than one way to get there, so never simply resign yourself to taking the same road(s) on the way back home that you took to your vacation destination. Taking 'new' roads all the way out and back keeps the sense of adventure and vacation going for much longer. By the same token, make sure (especially when young children are part of the group) to have one or two stops on tap for each day, so that you're never that far from the next destination and you're not trying to fill days at a time with in-car 'activities' to ward off the cries of "Are we there yet?"

Now, on to some specifics. I would probably go well "out of my way" to avoid taking an RV or two through the Chicago area even at off-peak daytime hours. So the first thing I'd suggest you look at is heading north into the UP and cross the Mackinac Bridge. At it's southern end is a great stop, Colonial Michilimackinac State Historical Park. You could then follow either coast, Lake Michigan or Lake Huron, with their multiple state and national parks down into southern Michigan. Very generally aim for Findlay OH in order to use US-224 as an alternative to the monotonous and costly Turnpike and then use I-271 to visit Cuyahoga Valley National Park and put yourselves back up on the Lake Erie shore on either I-90 or US-20 up towards Niagara. Your next segments, Niagara to Boston and New England have been dealt with elsewhere so have a read through those for ideas.

Finally, your drive home should, as noted above, take a different route. One scenic route that is often recommended as a destination in itself, is US-6 across northern Pennsylvania. Taking this would also put you in position (at its start) to visit the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area. As an alternative to your eastbound route, once you're past Cleveland, take a look at OH-2 along the Lake Erie shore which puts you in position to see both the Bass Islands and a great old amusement park, Cedar Point, in Sandusky. You can then take either the opposite shore north through Michigan and back to the Mackinac Bridge and home, of press on regardless through Chicago.

AZBuck