Maps don’t break down.
I second the AAA membership, their trip planning help is pretty good.
I’ll also say that REI sells the National Park pass - pretty good deal if you’re gonna be hitting quite a few.
My husband will probably bring the GPS. (He’s a technology junkie.) I will probably bring the maps. (I’m the low-tech nerd.) 
If you already own a laptop, bring that. And get a power inverter for it from somewhere like Walmart or Target; so you can run it on the car’s power. (Check power requirements). This will be good for maps, campgrounds, hotels etc etc. Many interstate rest areas (though not all) have or are putting in, free wifi. (Bring a lock for the laptop for when/if you stay at a hotel.)
No laptop? Bring your cell phone and a couple of those freebie hotel directories. That way you can call ahead and make or cancel reservations depending upon what conditions you find.
My first trip out west, to the Yellowstone/Tetons area was years ago. I called up a travel agent that worked with our company in early April and asked for help getting reservations for a June trip. She exclaimed “THIS JUNE???” Things fill up fast out there, so you will need to be flexible. Because of the economy, this might be an advantageous year to go.
Someone suggested Mt. Rushmore. Lots of people like it. My family and I were unimpressed.
Several have suggested the Yellowstone area. It is quite good. So is Glacier.
The animals are NOT tame. It is quite possible that you will have an extremely close encounter with a buffalo in the Yellowstone area. Just because they will walk near the car doesn’t mean they like you.:eek:
One set of binoculars for each of you.
Be mindful that a day of sightseeing can be totally sidetracked by severe weather.
If you do travel to “The West”, be prepared for vast stretches of treeless plain and prairie in the mid-section, before coming up on the mountains.
As someone upthread noted, buying groceries is far cheaper than dining out every meal. A collapsible cooler filled with some cold soda, fruits, deli meats etc can go a long way. (Don’t forget the bread) 
Sometimes it is a long way between cities. A loooooong way. Be mindful of where you are and what the fuel gauge reads.
Using Mapquest or similar, plot out how many hours away things are from day to day. The West is BIG. Do not assume you can drive in 8 hours what Mapquest says will take 12 hours, just because it doesn’t look all that far on a map. Some mountain highways take a less than direct path.
Travel and Tourism boards of the various states you plan to visit will be happy to send you things like maps, event calendars and so forth. Call, email, or write them.
A note about fuel for the car. As you gain altitude by going out west, you will find it increasingly hard to buy the same octane as what you are used to. That’s because (if I recall correctly) a car is less likely to ‘knock’ or ‘ping’ due to pre-mature detonation at higher altitudes. Unless your car currently demands premium, going with whatever is the mid-grade should be fine.
Please do not eat at any restaurant you recognize from home. Be adventurous… but pack the pepto.
And I’ll definitely agree with others on buying the Natl Parks Pass. Most Natl Parks (the big ones anyway) have a place at the park entrance you can buy the pass. Entrance Passes (U.S. National Park Service) The plus side of buying it at the gate is that you don’t start using it until the day you show up. The downside is that you have to wait in line and force the cars behind you to wait in line as well.
Promise yourselves, before and during the trip, to be good to eachother.
Missed edit window.
Be careful about alcohol consumption the first few days at altitude. It can hit you a lot harder than you think until you get acclimated.
Lots of good advice so far, but I just wanted to add, if you do manage to talk some friends into it, make sure you can stand being with the person/people for extended periods of time. This doesn’t apply so much to your husband, of course, as I assume you already spend most of your free time at least in the same home as he does. But I’m a veteran road-tripper, and I can tell you, nothing makes a road trip worse than short tempers from being stuck in a car for an extended period of time with a person whose habits and faults are magnified a hundredfold by their extreme proximity to you and the fact that you can’t get away from them.
This can also apply to your husband, however, if you don’t get to spend at least a little time with your own personal space. Scheduling extended breaks, like stopping for lunch in a quaint town and allowing an hour of wandering time so you can get away from each other and see and do something more interesting than playing the license plate game.
Other than that, depending on your time frame, of course, try to be a little less concerned with your destination and make a fun journey the goal. Most of my road trips have been destination-oriented, so I’ve gotten to miss out on a lot of things I’d really like to see along the way because of the pressing schedule of getting to new Jersey for that concert. It was really awesome on the way home from Pittsburgh that my fellow history nerd friend and I got to stop by Antietem.
With a little planning you’ll have a great time. Have fun!
What fun! I’m jealous - I’d love to do a trip like this again. Back in 1985, Typo Knig and I did just such a trip. We too had a small-ish car - a Mazda 626. We bought an inexpensive clamshell carrier for the top of the car (in hindsight we possibly should have rented one, as they’re better quality), and that’s where most of our camping equipment stayed. Our backseat was full to the brim with coolers, suitcases and “need now” stuff.
We also did a combination of camping, hotels, and mooching off friends. Roughly 1/3 of the time in each. Camping when we had the time or were somewhere scenic (e.g. Grand Teton, down the west coast), mooching off friends when we could (Colorado, Seattle, Berkeley), and motels on the longer driving days.
Costs:
Figure out mileage (we put 8,000 miles on the car - from North Carolina through Colorado, up through Wyoming then to Seattle, down the coast to San Francisco, then home) and rough estimates for gas cost, and that’ll give you a budget for that portion .
You can save a lot on food by hitting a grocery store for things like sandwich fixings, for the driving and camping days. A large cooler in the backseat, with a fresh bag of ice every day or so, serves nicely as a fridge. On days where you’re camping and staying (as opposed to just camping for a night), you can even do a little cooking. We used a lot of convenience foods for those days (soup mixes, hot dogs, etc.).
Accommodations: If you own (or can borrow - where do you live? I suspect some nearby Dopers can help out) the camping equipment, a campground is definitely the cheapest way to go. I seem to recall a campsite being 10ish bucks a night, this was of course 20+ years ago. Obviously it’s a bit of a pain to drag into a campground after dark and have to set up a tent.
Meals: Budget say 20 bucks a day apiece for food. That’ll allow for groceries and one inexpensive meal out. Maybe budget a bit more for days when you’ll be mooching, if you like to treat the host to something.
Accommodations (hotels): You can easily look up sample hotel prices online for those days where you think that’s how you’ll stay. 75 bucks a night (or maybe a lot less) should get you a room somewhere. Hotel accommodations in the national parks can be pricey and hard to come by, so I’d recommend either camping inside the park, or hotelling it in the nearest town.
I’d consider joining AAA. If you break down, their roadside assistance might not be that useful depending on where you are (we had a hell of a time getting through to them when a friend locked her keys in the car at Shenandoah National Park, and they had no clue where we were; fortunately another friend did the deed with a coat hanger). But they’re good for maps, trip-tiks, and discounts on motels etc. The closest thing we had to a breakdown on our trip was a flat tire just as we got onto the Pacific Coast Highway in California; as this was pre-cell phones, we didn’t even attempt to call 'em but just changed it ourselves.
Bring stuff (music etc.) to listen to on the drive. There will be places where radio stations are next to impossible to find.
Car: as noted, you can do the trip in your small car, if there are just 2 of you. A larger car would eliminate the need for a clamshell carrier of course (unless you bring friends along).
Make lists of whatever you might want to bring. Jot down everything, and go over the list numerous times. You’ll find things you missed, and also stuff you realize you could do without after all.
Keep your sense of humor. When you’re up until 2 AM packing the night before you leave, it starts to look like not such a good idea. We had been on the road for a couple of hours before we thought it was an OK plan after all 
Good advice!!
There’ll be a few days where you just need to cover distance - but make sure to alternate sightseeing days with those where possible. On our trip, we took most of 3 days to get out to Colorado, just pushing it on the interstate, but then we had 4-5 days there to sightsee with minimal driving. Then a long day to Teton, then 5-6 days to sightsee. Then a long day+ to Seattle, etc. Then finished it up with 5 long driving days back from California. We had a handful of 12-14-hour driving days, but more time to spend at the destinations.
Mama Zappa has it about right.
There is so much to see. You will no doubt miss some good stuff. Do take along a notebook or journal. Not only to log what you did see, but things you want to go back to and spend more time around.
I am going to -assume- that you have 14 days total available. So some worthwhile sights will be missed. I am going to get a little specific as well.
Try to take I-80 out to I-76 toward Colorado. Try to time it such that you spend that evening in Colorado at say Sterling or Fort Morgan. Stay that night at a decent hotel. Sleep well. Freshen up. And get ready to hold on. Do not approach the Fort Collins or Denver area at night. No, not a safety issue, a scenic issue.
Take Highway 34 past Greeley and Loveland and in to Estes Park. Drive the Trail Ridge Road through the Rocky Mountain National Park. (Check to make sure it is open). For urbanites or those from “flat” states, there can be some serious white-knuckle driving there.
Connect back up with I-70 west.
Check your fuel gauge. Cities are going to become sparse.
Head up toward Provo and Salt Lake.
Make a side trip into the Wasatch Mtns and dine at Snowbird and take the tram ride.
Back on the road and heading north.
Take I-15 toward Idaho Falls. Then Highway 26; Highway 31 and Highway 22 toward Jackson WY
Try to make Colter Bay a base to explore from for several days.
It’s not terribly far to Yellowstone from there and it is quite scenic.
Yellowstone and the Tetons. Beautiful.
Geysers and mudpots and all that are ok; but be sure to see the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. I think that’s what they call it. Striking canyon views and you see very vividly why it was named Yellowstone. See “Artists Point”.
Again, the animals are not tame.
Still have time? Head up to Glacier Natl Park, and the Going toward the Sun road therein.
Time to head home now? Connect up with I-90. Consider a side trip to Devil’s Tower.
Now it becomes tricky. How much time do you have left? You can’t really appreciate the Black Hills unless you drive into it. Seeing it from the interstate does not do it justice. But, you also just came from the Tetons and Yellowstone.
The Badlands are coming right up too.
I have no idea if it is still there and under same ownership and so forth, but the best chicken fried steak I ever had was at the cafe’ attached to the Best Western in Kadoka, SD
Drive like all heck on I-90 or whatever to get home, because by now, your time is surely up.
Very good advice here so far. Jim and I love to road trip - we drove from Calgary to Chicago and back last year! Some things we’ve learned along the way:
- Get some good fiber laxative. For some reason, sitting in a car a lot really bungs things up.
- Stop at your local IHOP and get the coupon books for the area you’re in there - they have really good coupons for hotels in them. We found deals like $30 a night for decent hotels.
- We usually ate cereal in the hotel room, and either bought lunch or made sandwiches. Supper was our daily treat. We saved A LOT of money that way, and a lot of grease, too.
- Digital camera, memory card, and 15 minute rechargeable batteries with the car attachment. You have no idea how many pictures you can take when you have this setup. We also had a laptop with us and uploaded the pictures daily.
- If you go to Mt. Rushmore, allow at least half a day for the Crazy Horse Memorial center. It is AWESOME! Of all the cool things we’ve seen, it’s one of the coolest.
- If you go through Kansas, try to see the Wizard of Oz Museum in Waumego. It is also cool.
Please stop at all the funky local “tourist” spots!
When else will you see the worlds largest non-stick skillet, or Reds Gator World? The cheesiest ones make the best memories.
I love road trips out west, that’s why I keep posting to this thread, I guess.
St. Louis and the Arch. The Gateway to the west.
It is certainly something to see. A landmark. A literal starting point for your journey westward.
It also always seems to have a LOT of traffic congestion. All the east-west traffic has to cross over a very few bridges near the Arch. If you can, plan a route that by-passes St. Louis this time. The Arch is cool, but see it on another trip.
With only 14 days you’ve got to decide whether you’re doing a northern route or a southern route. I personnally prefer a Southerly route through southern Utah and Arizona. There’s such a high concentration of sites there --Arches, Canyonlands, Bryce, Zion, and the Grand Canyon, as well as, a drive through the Grand Staircase Escalante NM.
Although I enjoyed Yellowstone, I don’t think it handles the volume of visitors it gets very well. If you go there, expect long lines of cars. People stop in the road for no reason other than to snap photos (ocassionally the cars stop for the wildlife in the road, which makes sense, but makes for slow travel). Not far from Yellowstone in Montana is Bannack Montana, an old ghost town that has been preserved and made into a state park.
I agree with much that has been advised. Use some kind of trip planning software. I use MS Mappoint. Get a power converter so you can plug your laptop in while you drive. Keep a cooler filled with goodies. It’s so easy to eat fast food if you let yourself. You can keep fresh vegetables and lean deli cuts in the cooler to eat cheaper and more healthily.
I’m going to disagree with the poster that says to stop at the kitschy, roadside attractions. With only 14 days, I’d be disappointed to know that I stopped to see Wall Drugstore or the Mitchell Cornpalace instead of seeing the Badlands of South Dakota. The national parks really are a treasure to be seen. Mitchell Corn Palace, etc., can be interesting but should not be chosen over Badlands, Devil’s Tower —any of the national parks, IMHO.
Last thought, have an idea of which trail you want to hike in each park you plan to visit. You can’t do them all. There are plenty of pictures and websites describing the highlights of each trail and the level of difficulty.
Don’t forget the hand sanitizer!
Decide before you go that television is not a good idea and you will have to give it up for the duration.
Because getting up early is a good idea.
Eating breakfast early makes everything easier, and traveling in daylight beats night five ways.