Welcome aboard the RoadTrip America Forums!

The first time you do anything, and RoadTrips are no exception, there are a lot of details to consider that with more experience become second nature. So at this point, I'd suggest you look at the big picture and let the smaller details fall where they may. With more experience, the big picture items will be obvious and you can pay more attention to the details on later trips. Right now, you know roughly what you'd like to see, the 'West', but not specifically where to go or how you'd get there.

So, let's look at some basic planning parameters. Most people would generally say that the 'West' starts at the Rocky Mountains. That means if you use your own car and drive from home, you'll have to spend a minimum of four days to get there and back, two days each way. That would still leave you ten full days to explore, and of course you might enjoy the drives through the Great Plains. On the other hand, you can fly to any one of a number of jumping off points (Denver, Salt Lake City, Phoenix, Las Vegas, etc.) from Chicago and have more time to spend in the West, but at the cost of airfares and car rental. Also note that fying is no picnic these days, and you'll still have to spend the better part of a day going and a day coming home. On the other hand, the farther west you want to explore, the more the balance leans towards flying, which brings you to...

The other big decision you need to make is a destination more specific than 'the West'. Even two full weeks is not enough to see it all, so you'll need to do a little thinking about which portion you'd like to start with. Some possibilities include Red Rock Country (Grand Canyon, Zion, Bryce Canyon, Arches, etc.), northern Rockies (Yellowstone, Grand Tetons, Glacier, etc.), Pacific Northwest (Olympic NP, Cascades, Seattle, Mount Ranier, Columbia River Gorge, etc.), central Pacific Coast (Crater Lake, Redwoods, Point Reyes, San Francisco, etc.), southern deserts (Mojave, Death Valley, Las Vegas, Saguaro NP, Organ Pipe, etc.), or even some other area or combination of the above.

Once you've come to a decision on those two basic parts of your RoadTrip, then you can start worrying about details such as best sightseeing, hiking, and canoeing opportunities in a given area, But those first, basic choices are going to have to be up to the two of you.

AZBuck