Road tripping can be one of the most fun things you can do. It's a chance to explore the world around you, where the voyage is as important as the destination itself. Here at TheyMightBeRacing.com we do a number of road trips a year, some as short as a day adventure simply driving down a new road, to other longer and more epic adventures. Earlier this year my wife and I got the chance to drive about Scotland. This summer we're doing the great American summer vacation: piling the kids in the car and driving a few thousand miles just for the heck of it.
Now, some trips are "pick a compass direction and drive" and others are "what is the fastest route between point A and Point B". While some of my favorite trips are based on the former, my most boring trips are based on the latter. Our example trip is my family's summer vacation for this year. It's a little of both with an emphasis on the road less taken.
Before you leave on your trip there's planning involved. You need to figure out where you're going and how you're going to get there. So what's the best way to do it? When we plan out a road trip we start with a good physical road atlas.
You'll note that there's no computer involved here. Basically, computer screens were not designed for following maps. They work, but not when you're just wanting to easily browse. Another great feature of these books is the mileage between city charts. You'll want to spend a lot of time with these. In our example we're travelling from Phoenix, Arizona to Seattle, Washington. The goal of the trip is to visit family and see parts of the country we've never seen before.
My first step is to plot out the basic trip, making the necessary descisions on route based on whether we want to see the world or cover ground. The city to city charts give us a good idea of how long it will take to get from place to place. Using this information you can then figure out how many miles you need to cover each day to complete your trip. In our case, we're pretty lucky. I knew we wanted to explore from San Franciso northwards, so I calculated the fastest way there, and planned the rest of the days accordingly. As this is going to be a sightseeing trip and we have young children, the idea isn't to cover miles as much as it is to see the country. We settled on the rough level of 5 driving hours a day. That gives us at least 5 hours to explore as we go.
Now we introduce the technology. With my stopping points roughly mapped out we fed the data into Google Maps. Then, based on the estimated driving times we adjusted end points as best as possible to meet the daily driving requirements. We plan on driving up the western coastline, but then come south through Idaho and Utah. The data from our maps combined with Google maps gave us the following final routes:
Northwards: Phoenix to Seattle with a Canada sidetrack.
What is important to note on the northern route is that we're covering ground to get to San Francisco. There's no exploring time there. But once we reach that point, the route is entirely about seeing what there is to see and not about covering miles.
Southwards: Via Oregon, Idaho and Utah.
On the Southern trip it is also uncharted territory. We want to see all there is to see. There's a funny dogleg where we reenter Arizona. That's the route down to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. It's embarrasing to admit, but after 15 years in Arizona I've still not visited there!
Now that you have your route maps based from the Road Atlas and verified through Google maps you're in good shape. Depending on your technical bent you can either print out the Google maps or sent them to your GPS device.
If this sounds like too much effort you can order similar items from AAA provided you're a member. They are called Tryptych's. When I was a kid those things were worth their weight in gold. You couldn't produce anything better. With the days of the internet you can make better, but only with a fair bit of work.
Once I knew our route I met my greatest point of frustration: what to see as we went. I tried the many road trip web sites out there but they just didn't give me the information I wanted. I simply wasn't interested in packaged driving trips nor was I interested in redoing someone else's trip that had little relevance to my own. Then, by random, I stumbled across Roadside America This site links information about interesting American roadside attractions to Google maps! I followed my route on their site and came up with a million ridiculous places to stop along the way. The only thing that could have made this better was an option in Google Maps to add this data to my route (take note Google or Roadside America folks!).
With this data in hand we have our routes planned, we know where and how we're going and what opportunities there are along the way for sightseeing. The only remaining bit is to find places to stay. If you're an AAA Member they have services and discounts to help with motels and campgrounds. Otherwise you can use the travel site of your choice to do this. For an extra bit of excitement you can use your computer while you travel to book these sorts of sites as you go!
With this, you've got your trip planned. Now you need to pack, plan, and check the car!
Jody
