RoadTrip: Miles and Lodging

As I have discussed, I like being organized.  I had printed off a bunch of calendars to keep notes on as we progressed on our trip.  I didn't want to forget anything and two of the things that would definitely be forgotten were the miles driven per day and how much money we spent each night for lodging.

The miles were an approximation because we couldn't remember to check the odometer every morning but we knew about how far we drove based off of the routes we took.

All together, we ended up driving over 8,000 miles.  We averaged around 235 miles per day, which sounds like a lot but the average was skewed but a few of the long days. 

The longest day we had was our last day when we drove 1400 miles from Yellowstone to my parents house in Chicago.  We had 1 day when we drove just under 900 miles and our first 2 days were 535 miles and then 635 miles.  That totals close to 44% of the miles in just 4 days.

We had only 1 day when we didn't get in a car, in Las Vegas.  We had 13 days where we drove less than 100 miles.  We had a 8 day stretch when we drove 375, 370, 225, 230, 220, 130, 195, and 270 miles but that didn't slow us down from doing and seeing amazing things each of those days as most of the time we split up the driving with stops and we weren't afraid to get started on our days early.

As for lodging each night we split our stays with 19 nights in a tent, 8 in a hotel, 6 with friends, and 1 in a tipi (teepee).  We spent a total of $1,154 for 33 nights, which averages just under $35 per night.  Our cheapest night (not including friends' houses, thanks friends!) was $6 at a campsite in Colorado.  We also stayed a few $10 sites and most campsites costs between $20 and $35 per night.

We were bargain hunters when it came to hotels and we stayed for $54, $49, and $56 in Colorado and New Mexico.  We scored a room at the Flamingo in Las Vegas for $43 a night for two nights, it helped that we were there mid-week.  In LA, I saw a groupon type deal online for $99 for a oceanview room, that included breakfast and bike rentals. We stayed for $54 at a hotel outside of Yosemite that we ended up being there for under 6 hours as we checked in at 11 and left before 5 a.m. but we were glad to not have to stay long as it wasn't the nicest place.  But you get that sometimes with a hotel room that cheap.

Our last hotel stay was the only one that we didn't shop around at because I wanted to take Megan to a place where my family went to 6 or 7 times when I was a kid, Togwotee Mountain Lodge.  We rented a cabin for a night and it cost $250 but it is a special place for me so that was fine by me to splurge.