Road trippin’ across the Western USA
Exactly five years ago I was slap bang in the middle of a road trip through the Western USA with Trek America. My first Trek America tour. A two-week camping trek with eleven other solo travellers and one amazing tour leader!
This wasn’t my first time travelling in the USA, or on a group tour and I’d already travelled solo around the world. So what made this trip so special? Quite simply, the people who came along for the ride! The itinerary Trek America put together was also amazing, covering highlights of the Western USA through California, Nevada, Arizona and Utah in two weeks. Combining mountains and deserts with awesome cities and beaches. Every single day of that road trip was epic and I definitely fell in love with the USA. I’m so grateful for having shared those experiences with twelve fantastic people, some of whom I love very much.
The route
The current itinerary has changed from the one we did in 2009 and we mixed things up a little because we visited a couple of places that weren’t on the itinerary (thanks to our tour leader Lauren), which made it even more amazing. This is a rough overview of the places we visited, which may give inspiration if you’re planning to do your own road trip of the Western USA, if group travel isn’t your thing:
- Day 1: LA to Big Sur via Santa Barbara
- Day 2: Big Sur to San Francisco
- Day 3: San Francisco
- Day 4: San Francisco to Yosemite National Park
- Day 5: Yosemite National Park
- Day 6: Yosemite National Park to Las Vegas
- Day 7: Las Vegas
- Day 8: Las Vegas to the Grand Canyon via Seligman (Route 66)
- Day 9: Grand Canyon
- Day 10: Grand Canyon to Monument Valley
- Day 11: Monument Valley to Cowboy Camp at Betty and Rusty’s (Sonoran Desert, Arizona)
- Day 12: Cowboy Camp to San Diego
- Day 13: San Diego
- Day 14: San Diego to LA
Western USA in under 5 minutes!
Following the trek, I put together a video using photos from the trip. It’s pretty crammed and fast-paced because we did so much in those two weeks! The soundtrack had to be I gotta feeling by The Black Eyed Peas because this is the theme tune of our trek. Sure, there are other songs on our road trip playlist but it’s always this song that makes me smile (no matter what kind of day I’m having) and I immediately think of these guys and this adventure!
“End of the trail, beginning of the dream”
I came home from LA in October 2009 determined to go back and road trip more of the USA and that’s exactly what I’ve been doing for the last five years and will continue to do so (when the day job allows – I’m based in the UK). I’ve road tripped from New York to Miami, New York to LA, through the Deep South and around Washington State into Canada. I’ve also been back a few times to the Western USA and this summer I was in Alaska – a road trip I never even anticipated doing five years ago!
When I’m not on the road in the USA I love nothing more than getting together with my road trippin’ buddies, to re-live the great memories we share and to make new ones!
I have no idea where my next American road trip adventure will take me, I have plenty of ideas of places I want to return to as well as visiting somewhere new to me. I’m open to inspiration though, if there’s somewhere you think I should visit, make some suggestions in the comments below! I’d also really love to hear about your travel plans; where will your next road trip take you?
Disclaimer: I was not asked to write this post and received no payment for it.