My partner and I are planning to take a trip from New Zealand to the western US next year. At the moment we are thinking of being there 4 weeks or so. He wants to visit Disneyland. I’d like to visit the Grand Canyon and Las Vegas. We’d also thought of visiting Yellowstone Park.
We can arrange to arrive in Los Angeles and leave from San Francisco or possibly even Vancouver, to include some time in Canada.
I’d like people to give opinions on places to go, things to do and also make suggestions about travel around. Rental car, rental RV or what? Should I think about flying from California/Nevada to Yellowstone or is the trip worth doing by road?
We’re both in our fifties and unlikely to do any hiking or prolonged walking, so wilderness areas are not on our itinerary.
It’s about a 10 hour drive from Bozeman Mt to Seattle Wa (does not include visiting the park) Seattle has a pretty cheap Amtrak route to Vancouver and Vancouver is easy for public transportation. You can also take the fast ferry from Seattle to Victoria, then ferry from Victoria to Vancouver to check out another city.
First off have a great trip and welcome to the states
I would suggest a rental car, Los Angeles can be a real traffic nightmare in anything larger(I tour with bands for a living and drive large vehicles and trailers). Yellowstone is far from where you will be and the closest airport is in Jackson, Wyoming a haven for the very wealthy and quite expensive. So if I may…
LA enjoy Disneyland and spend a day at the beach
Drive North towards San Francisco on the Pacific Coast Highway(PCH), stop a lot and enjoy the outrageous views Santa Barbra, San Louis Obispo, Monterrey Bay(Whales and Orcas) Santa Cruz and Half Moon Bay(Maverics, biggest waves I have ever seen, my timing was good). Take your time and stay over a bit
Spend a few days in San Francisco its small 127km2+/- and has fantastic mass transit(by American Standards) This is my favorite city in North America bring a warm coat, or you will buy one
Lake Tahoe and Yosemite National Park are a few hours drive from SF and IMHO are the Natural Mona Lisa’s of the that corner of the world., slip over the backside of the Sierra Nevadas to Las Vagas over the Hoover Dam and on to the Grand Canyon, don’t pass on the Canyon trust me, consider going to the North Rim of the Canyon its out of the way to say the least.
A couple of warnings
The travel distances in the US west can be daunting and drivers can be impolite.:dubious: Undertaking(passing in the “slow lane”) on the Highway is generally legal and routine, get the insurance with the rental car
Be prepared for weird questions from uninformed Americans. They are just curious and generally don’t bite:D
I have been all over the place any questions you have I will be happy to answer and of course our fellow Dopers will have their informed opinions as well
If you’re going to the Grand Canyon (south rim most likely), Monument Valley isn’t that far away. And as long as you’re going through Monument Valley you might as well check out the Needles district of Canyonlands and Arches. You have to hike in Canyonlands to get to the good stuff, though. Arches is better for parking and taking a short walk to the sights. For big-city thrills you can go to Moab :D. That whole area is very unique.
You can go east into Colorado, see Mesa Verde, Durango, go for a drive through some pretty big mountains through Silverton, Ouray, maybe Telluride, there’s just so much to see - before heading up to Yellowstone.
You may wish to consider a Campervan (http://www.escapecampervans.com/). I learned about them last month when we were at Bryce Canyon in Utah and met a couple visiting from New Zealand who’d rented one. How 'bout that. The nice thing is than you can return it in San Francisco or Las Vegas.
I’ll warn you that the West is very, very vast. Even with a full four-weeks, you’ll want to decide whether you want a whirlwind tour of a lot of places or to settle down for a bit in fewer places and plan your trip from there. F’rinstance, driving distance between LA and Vancouver is 1300 miles/2100 km. Even LA to San Francisco is 380 miles/610 km. Then going inland you’re looking at about 920 miles/1480 km from San Fran to Yellowstone, so choose destinations wisely.
On your way to Yellowstone, hit Salt Lake City in Utah (for the lake, not the town), and also spend some time at Craters of the Moon National Monument in Idaho. Craters has driving and easy walking tours plus caves and interesting geography.
Billings to Yellowstone also isn’t a bad drive and is probably going to be even cheaper than Bozeman. Sometimes they have ludicrously cheap flights from there to Vegas. That drive would also give you a little taste of the Great Plains. If Peter Jackson hasn’t lied to me, spectacular mountains will be a dime a dozen to you New Zealanders, but how often do you get to see endless tracts of barren grassland? Driving Billings to Yellowstone gives you about 100 miles of plains, which should be just enough to last you a lifetime.
Right now there’s also a cheap flight from Kalispell to San Francisco (well, Oakland), so one possibility for a Rocky Mountain sidetrip would be to fly into Billings or Bozeman, see Yellowstone and the Tetons, and then drive up from there to Glacier National Park and then fly back to the Bay Area. Yellowstone to Glacier is a bit of a drive, but there’s about 4 or 5 routes you can take, all of them pleasant drives with spectacular views.
Starting in LA, visiting Yellowstone or Canda would be a long, long haul but you could do either one in 4 weeks. If you like to drive, that is. On the other hand, 4 weeks would be a good amount of time to dedicate just to California.
Rental car! Definitely not an RV because you’re less flexible for where to stay, you go slower and you’re limited to not driving on smaller roads. The western US has many mountains and an RV will climb slowly.
Drive the area, as there is a lot to see here. If you fly, you’ll miss so much.
There are SO MANY places to explore, if you’re not careful you can overextend your agenda and try to do too much, so plan wisely. I’ve done all of the below except for Channeled Scablands, and heartily recommend them.
Channeled Scablands in eastern Washington state.
Monument Valley in Northern Arizona and Southern Utah.
Canyon de Chelly in NE Arizona.
Yosemite National Park in Eastern California.
Crater Lake in southern Oregon.
Mount St. Helens in SW Washington state, and see the blast damage from the 1980 eruption.
The Pacific Coast drive along Washington, Oregon and California.
Death Valley National Park in California.
The city of Sedona, Arizona. Take a Pink Jeep guided tour of the mountains above Sedona along Schnebly Hill Rd.
The cities of San Diego and Coronado.
If you get to New Mexico, see White Sands National Monument and Carlsbad Caverns.
The two best things IMHO are quite a ways apart… Glacier National Park on the Montana/Alberta border. and Monument Valley in the Utah/Arizona border. Don’t miss either of them.
But if you do make it to Glacier/Waterton (Glacier in Montana, and Waterton in Alberta; the two national parks are joined as an international peace park), give us a heads-up. Waterton is only about an hour away from me–we’ll organize a Dopefest!
Monument Valley was really beautiful. I enjoyed it more than the grand canyon.
Be weary with the canyon. I stayed just south and took the train in. It was nice but the hotel and train were not worth the cost by any means. I thought of going to skywalk but saw so many negative comments I didn’t feel it worth it. Monument valley i paid a small entrance fee and there were only a few of us out there. Sunset was sublime and I wish I had stayed at that hotel.
I use Travelocity extensively for their “mystery hotels” and for opinions.
Horseshoe bend in Page was also more interesting, to me, than the Canyon.
