Who here has driven across America–Atlantic to Pacific (or Pacific to Atlantic)–in one trip? If so, when did you do it? How long did it take you? What route did you take? Tell about it.
Neat topic.
The best I can say is Milwaukee to Seattle. My friend and I left around 2:30am Saturday, drove 2 blocks, only to stop to watch the northern lights for a good 15 minutes. That was a cool surprise.
We drove pretty much non-stop (gas, food, bathrooms) until we were in eastern North Dakota. The car was running hot, so we stopped at a rest area, lifted the hood, and just chilled for an hour. The rest of the trip, we couldn’t use a/c, drove mostly with the windows down, and often with the heat on. But, we didn’t have the car overheat again.
The highlight (for me) was at dusk, driving in eastern Montana, and watching the sun set behind the smokey skies from the 2000 wildfires. We stopped at another rest area near Butte, I believe, for about 3 hours sleep, and then finished the drive Sunday, pulling into Seattle around 3:30pm local time. So, it was about 39 hours. We barely broke the speed limit on the highways though, due to the stupid car.
I also had a trip from Milwaukee to Miami, leaving Thursday afternoon, driving through the night, and it took about 25 hours, with a fair amount of breaks. We went for a football game Saturday at noon. The game was a dud, and I just wanted to get home afterward, so we left immediately. We got back home around 4pm Sunday afternoon. 66% of the trip was spent in the car, for a game which lasted a hair over 3 hours.
Texas to California is the longest stretch for me, with overnight stops in Albuquerque, Flagstaff and the Grand Canyon and an afternoon gambling in Vegas (won $50 and wanted to stay, but the wife did what I told her to by insisting on moving on when it got to be a certain time). But I happen to know my grandfather travelled between New York and California by train at least twice in the early 20th century.
My family did when I was a kid a couple of times. We lived in Virginia, and my aunt lived in San Diego. Mostly I remember all six of us in the Ford Galaxy. Eating baloney sandwiches on the side of the road in the dessert, playing car games with my sisters and brother. Being the youngest and stuck in the middle over the hump that ran down the back seat, being small enough to stand up on the back seat without my head touching the roof of the car and that everyone smoked and no one wore seatbelts.
ETA: I once tried to drive cross country with a girlfriend at the time, but the trip and the relationship ended prematurely around New Mexico.
Make that “at least three times.”
Several times. My family has “road trip” in our blood.
The last three times we started in Jersey, went across 80 to Michigan (where I grew up), then to Chicago to visit friends, then across 90 through S. Dakota, stopping by Mt. Rushmore, Wyoming, Montana, across a bit of Idaho, to Spokane. Then we continued west through Oregon, visiting family in the Portland area. From there, we took I-5, going south through California, visiting family in the SFO area and then in the LA area.
Going back, we went through Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Texas, visiting friends in Colorado and Texas. The remainder of the drive was a push to get home ASAP, driving through Tennessee, Virginia, and eventually up I-5 back home.
Other times, I have gone through the center of the country.
One of these days I want to do the same kind of route, but in a clockwise fashion.
We always rent a car and the drive usually comes out to be 7,500 miles and three weeks long.
I’ve done it twice, both on the same trip. We got a deadhead car (just paid for gas to transport someone’s private vehicle). We had 5 drivers and made it from Santa Barbara to New Jersey in 69 hours. I still think I have an outstanding speeding ticket ticket in Indiana. We pretty much took I70 the whole way.
On the way back, we took a bit more time (7days). We only had one cassette, London Calling. Oddly enough, I still love that album. We went from NYC up to Niagara Falls and then through Canada to somewhere near Detroit and then went through Madison. We took I90 through South Dakota. The badlands are absolutely phenomenal. Mount Rushmore is worth a look-see.
I can’t remember how we got to Yellowstone, but that is one fantastic park. After that we went by the Grand Tetons and then somehow ended up in Santa Barbara.
My buddy’s mom wants him to move her car from San Luis Obispo to Philly, so I’m considering doing it again. We’d go through Vegas to the Grand Canyon, then through New Mexico and then Austin to take in some music. From there we’d go to New Orleans and then take the East Coast up. I haven’t hit much of the south so I could knock a bunch of those states off. I’d love to take the Blueridge Parkway.
Gone from Whidbey Island, WA to Jacksonville, FL once, returned to Whidbey Island via San Diego on that trip. Another change of station involving a factory school meant I traveled from San Diego, though Texas to Georgia and then to Long Island, NY, and returned to Ventura, CA via Denver. I’ve made so many trips between cities in Washington and California, they all sort of run together. I do recall driving through Kentucky in 1968 on a twisty road behind a cattle truck, which was not the high point of that trip.
When I was budgeting for these trips, I used to call Greyhound and ask the cost of a one-way ticket to my destination. Travel expenditures were always within $20 of that fare…plus or minus. I have no idea how I managed that, but it was so routine I could depend on it.
Maybe three or four times when I was a kid from Camp Lejeune NC to Camp Pendelton CA and back. Once I hitch-hiked from NC to California in four days. Once I drove from San Diego to NC in two weeks (my girlfriend wanted to see Crater Lake).
Jeez, you forgot CA to NC in 48 hours of nonstop driving wit’ me.
Oh, I forgot. We had to get 3rd dementia’s truck from CA to NC so he could drive it to Canada. I bought a Country/Western music tape on the way (I think it was J. Cash) trying to annoy him. It turned out that he knew all the songs and could sing along.
NC to CA on I-40: Best time: 2 days. Worst Time: About 9 in a U-Haul doing 45 MPH at best.
We just moved from Seattle to Baltimore- and, since we’ve got three dogs, we drove it. We rented an RV for the trip, and did it in about 9 days. We did a bit of a detour to go through Yellowstone, stopped for a few hours at Mt. Rushmore, then visited my brother-in-law for two days in Illinois.
I wouldn’t mind doing it again- we had a lot of fun.
When I was a kid we moved from Seattle to Washington, DC. I think we took about a week and a half to drive across, making a few stops for seeing sights, but not too many. I mainly recall driving through Yellowstone and then Montana, staying somewhere in Iowa, driving through Chicago, even spending the night in Dayton - Dad’s company was headquartered there.
This trip started in the back of a Mercury faux wood paneled station wagon. The car broke down in Montana and we had to buy a new Buick Electra 225 (this was in 1970, iirc). We learned all of the words to the rock musical *Hair *as young kids because we mostly just listened to the eight track tape player on the trip. It was interesting to later learn what words like sodomy, fellatio, cunnilingus and pederasty meant.
My father had to make a second trip back to get his other car and drive it across the US. I think it was a fairly new Olds Cutlass. Unfortunately for him, my brother had gotten car sick in it the week before, and he got to drive with that less than pleasant odor the whole trip. I think solo it took him about 4-5 days.
Drove from Malibu to Cleveland, got married, then drove to NYC for the honeymoon. Took the 70 to Ohio then the 80 to NYC.
Does that count?
The longest run I’ve had was from Wichita, Kansas to Boise, Idaho, to help my brother move up here. I flew one-way into ICT, got a U-Haul truck and then helped him load up all of his worldly posessions. We rolled out in the evening and we went up I-135 to Salinas, where we stopped for the night. The next day took us west on I-70 across western Kansas and eastern Colorado to Denver, where we then headed north on I-25. We hit Denver right at rush hour. I really wanted to continue westward on I-70 and see the grandeur of the Rockies, but I wasn’t sure how well the truck would handle the mountain grades (I’m sure it would have made it, but it may have been slow-going), so we opted for the less scenic route through Wyoming. It was nighttime anyway, so I wouldn’t have seen anything but the dark sky. Once we got north of the Colorado border we headed west on I-80, at which time the sun was just going down. Much of this trip was long, straight and seemingly unending. I can’t say as I missed much since I looked at Google street view to see what this stretch of interstate looks like in the daytime. We made it as far as Green River and stopped for the night, having gone over 800 miles in one day. We were going to stop in Rock Springs, but we couldn’t find a decent motel with any vacancy, and the girl at the desk was rather surly to me anyway, so I’m glad I didn’t give them any of my business. The next day we continued on and got off I-80 just before the town of Little America and headed north on I-30 (going straight through to Utah would have made the trip longer). We crossed the border into Idaho and rejoined the interstate and hooked into I-15 just south of Pocatello. We then headed west to Boise and made it into town at about 5:00 PM, just in time for rush hour again. All in all it was a good trip, spanning the equivalent of about two whole days.
I’ve done it a few times, mostly by motorcycle, though I have never been beach to beach I’ve been close enough. I also did it once from California to Maryland as a kid in a car. I don’t remember anything of that trip except sneaking the cat into a hotel dressed as a baby.
I’ve been from Maryland to California going south through Alabama and across I-40 mostly. Drove up the coast and through California to Washington. Then back across the country to Maine via Colorado. Then finally back south home.
I’ve also done a couple of trips from Maryland out to Montana and Wyoming areas.
I suggest anyone thinking about doing something like that to just do it. It’s a lot of fun and you get to see lots of places and odd things. I can’t wait for the kids to grow up so I can take them as well.
I drove from Portland, Maine to San Diego, California.
It took me 6 days.
Portland, ME to Savannah, GA to Memphis, TN to Amarillo, TX to Flagstaff, AZ to Las Vegas, NV to San Diego, CA
I’ve done Seedro Wooley, Washington to Redlands, California in 18 hours.
I’ve driven Pacific to Atlantic and back, just not all at once. And it was 40 years ago, so my experiences aren’t likely to be very helpful.
I started crossing the US from Maine and went through to DC, Smokies National Park, to Omaha, then Colorado, Utah, Vegas and up to San Fran before heading back home to Portland, OR.
To get to Maine I’d driven east through Canada - which was awesome too. The entire trip took 3 months as we made lots of detours. It was my wife and I, and we were camping most of the time and drove our truck with camper on the back. We stayed in about 20 different National Parks in Canada/US as well as many Provicial/State parks. Saw a lot of good stuff, but I wouldn’t bother doing it again. From a camping/outdoorsy perspective, all the best stuff was in the western US and Canada plus the Maritime provinces.