It's about this time every year that I start to think about what I (we) want to do next summer, and this time we are thinking of doing something a little different.

I've never done America, and don't think I have the time to do it all in one go. So I think doing it a corner at a time spread over a good few years sounds like a plan! This is partially inspired by Stephen Fry's current series on the BBC.

I have been taking to robricc about a road trip starting in and around the New York area, taking in the sites over a week or so with a couple of days either side in New York itself. During the road trip part itself we would like to do a fair amount of driving each day so we can cover a lot of ground and see lots of different things.

Our budget is going to be very very tight, so this won't we a tour of luxury Hotels of America, but it will be more of a honest American Road Trip. We are thinking about mid to late June 2009.

Any suggestions of places to visit, and things to do? Any interest in joining us, and maybe turning this into an empeg event for next year?

Cheers

Cris.

cheap? how about free?
http://www.couchsurfing.com/

Cool concept!

Cheers

Cris.

IMO for the most part a city is a city no matter where in the world you are. Some in the US are definitely interesting (Washington DC, San Francisco, LA, New York) but to me they just don't compare to the unique nature sites the US.

I would suggest seeing:

- Grand canon
- Death valley
- Lake Tahoe
- Big Sur

You could make it an authentic American road trip.

Err... s/world/North America/, and then that statement becomes closer to truth.

Rome, Paris, London, Berne, Firenze, Perugia, Sydney, Vancouver.. all very unique and very fun cities to visit.

Cheers

Awesome, Bitt!
I always wanted my very own muffler man...
http://www.roadsideamerica.com/muffler/

agreed

They're more unique than the other unique cities?

(Sorry. Pet peeve.)

I agree cities are generally no fun for vacationing unless you like to walk around looking at the mostly boring standard tourist sites (Sears Tower in Chicago, Space Needle in Seattle). I would add to natural sites to visit:
Smoky Mountain National Park (Tennesse)
Mammoth Cave (Kentucky)
Mt Rainier National Park (Washington)
Yellowstone (Wyoming/Montana)

Only part of our visit will be spent in the city of New York. I should have made it clearer, we intend to start in the state of New York and explore surrounding states.

I think it would be foolish to miss out on the New York (city) experience, it could be a once in a life time visit for me.

Cheers

Cris.

Depends on what you want to see/experience, but for the cultural experience, I suggest Stuttgart, AK, and Lubbock, TX.

For scenery, you have to do New Mexico (Santa Fe?), Sedona, AZ, and Telluride, CO... And if you are in AZ, there is always the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base... Oh, I could go on for ever...

How long are you intending to be out there for?

We figured a week on the road, and then another week split either side one end in New York city and the other somewhere else. We wouldn't want to be doing more than 200 miles per day, so would have to be in the North East corner and maybe into Canada a little.

Cheers

Cris.

Well, sleepy Ottawa qualifies on the "into Canada a little" front.

We're about 7.5 hours driving time from NYC, up interstate 87, and then branching off through Keene Valley, Keene, Lake Placid, Saranac Lake, Massena, on the NY side, and then crossing the border to Cornwall, and less than an hour from there to here.

Nice drive that route, with possible stopovers anywhere in the Keene through Saranac Lake areas of the Adirondack Mountains.

Free B&B at our place here (of course!). But Montreal is even slightly closer to NYC, and might have more appeal. Or it could be "done" as a day-trip by rail from here, taking advantage of one of the few good rail connections left in Canada.

Cheers

Heck, if you fancy a tiny little bit of adventure, we could even meet you in the Adirondacks, with an extra tent & sleeping bags, and overnight in a very quiet (drive in) mountain campground our club owns there.

Maybe go out for a short ramble or something, and then continue on into Canada.

Just throwing out some more possibilities.

Honestly, I don't know of many places in NY to see, but in your visits to "the corners" of the country, don't miss the right-hand side part

Washington D.C. is indeed a unique city (no Bit, no more unique than any other), and the fact is you could tour the city for days and never pay for anything but food and lodging. All the museums in town are free (except for one, darn Newseum), and that's saying something given the very high number and quality of the museums the town has to offer. Then there's the monuments, and some nice parks.

Also, one of my favorite things about the area is that you don't have to get very far out of the city to see nature. 15 miles out of Washington is a large national park (Great Falls Park) with class 4 rapids (and great observation decks to see all the nuts taking them on).

As far as eating goes, it's not NYC, but it's a pretty ethnically diverse area, and there's restaurants to cater to people here. I love my local Persian restaurant, and while there's more Chinese restaurants in our country than there are McDonalds, there's one in particular in our area that all the politicians (including Presidents) go to. More importantly, it's the only Chinese restaurant that I've seen Chinese people eat at (and large groups of them).

Anyway, I would offer a room, but I'm not sure if we have the space. But I hope you make it out to the D.C. area. As far as tourism goes, I think it has a lot to offer.


Oh, and Seattle is wonderful in August.

If you're interested in American History, I quite enjoyed Old Sturbridge Village. Also, Boston's Freedom Trail. Niagara Falls is worth a look. I've spent a pretty limited amount of time in the northeast, so that's all that comes to mind at present.

Berlin, Amsterdam, Prague, St. Petersburg, Cape Town..., but also New York, San Francisco...

Ugh, so little time!

Cheers!

No, no, no, you spend a month in a city, pretending to be a native, and exploring parts that your folks back home will not recognize on your snapshots. You are not allowed to leave until farmers' market vendors know you by name and you don't need to look up public transportation network details on a map.

But that nature thing is also OK

Cheers!

Bonzi

We live in America... we don't get that much vacation time.

Neither do I, but one can dream...

I did have an experience like that, though, twice: once as a student spending the whole summer in Dubrovnik (I could afford it then; now it is a ridiculously expensive place). The other occasion was when I was consulting for SNCF in Paris for almost six months and all the weekends were free. I had marvelous time!

We do have a couple of (relative) seniors here, though, who can engage in such an activity. I keep dreaming of early retirement so I could join them; in the meantime, I am green () with envy.

I only hope that our resident Cassandra, Doug, does not turn out to be right again. If he does, we will have other things to worry about in our retirement rather than travel plans...

Cheers!

Bonzi