Discussions

We have some time off this summer and looking at doing some different things than our regular vacation ideas.  
 
If you could take a road trip anywhere in Canada from here, where would you go? What would you stop and look at it? How far would you drive? Or are you more spontaneous and would just drive for one week and go where it took you before coming home? (For a 2 week trip for example but we can be pretty flexible with time) Or is it better to have it mapped out? Know where you should be each day and by when? Have hotel rooms all lined up?  
 
Or is there anywhere along the US border you would go that would allow you to do/see fun and interesting things on both sides of the divide? Is going back and forth over the border during a trip like this okay or would you get asked a lot questions?? Lol  
 
Would you take your car? Would you rent a small RV and just camp wherever? Stay in a hotel a few nights?  
 
Looking at pros and cons and things we might have missed for each scenario and wondering what others have done or would do if they could go on a 2-4 week long road trip!

We drove out to the west coast this past summer via moose jaw, Lethbridge, then the crowsnest pass and the #3 highway to Vancouver. It was a great trip, we camped most of the time except the first two nights. Took our own car (Chevy cobalt) but we did see a ton of people in rented RVs. Camping is by far your most cost effective accommodation as we found that hotels in some of the places we visited were pretty expensive.

This is exactly what we do! Every two years we take a 3 week road trip. We plan roughly using Google maps or an atlas, the route that we want to take. This can change and will change depending on how we feel along the way. We have estimations for about how far we want to get each day but there’s no plans and no hotel rooms booked ahead of time. We stop and see whatever we want to see along the way based on roadsigns. We also get CAA maps and road trip but clicks to see if we can find any neat things that are off the beaten path. We also do rough Google searches along the path to see if there’s any other attractions or places we should stop. In the summer of 2016 we drove out to the very eastern tip of Newfoundland and back. In 2015 we drove down to Wisconsin Dells and spend a week at a resort and then came back. In 2014 we drove through the northern states to Oregon and then along the California coast down to Mexico and back up the interior states. It makes for some pretty amazing road trips. This year we’re going out west to BC and then up to Alaska and over to Yellowknife and then back down through Alberta and Saskatchewan to home. We cover roughly 2000 to 2500 km per road trip. Like I said no hotels are booked ahead of time and all we have is a rough guesstimate of the highways we want to take and the routes we want to take.

In 2010 I drove with my then 9 and 11 year old girls from Winnipeg through Edmonton, Fort St John up the Alaska Highway to a friend's place 4 hours north of Whitehorse Yukon, then down through the interior of BC to stop and visit friends in Vernon on our way home, it was a beautiful drive, and great to see girlfriends I hadn't seen in many many years! I would do it again in a heartbeat, something like 3800 km each way, I did plan my route, and was prepared to camp wherever along the way and had friends to stay with

So much between here and there. #1 along the north shore of Lake Superior, Toronto, Montreal, I love old Quebec City. Get all the way to the north part of Newfoundland. I need to get there one day:  
 
http://www.pc.gc.ca/en/lhn-nhs/nl/meadows

When I was 12, my family took a 3-week road trip to the West Coast. That was almost 30 years ago and I still remember it fondly! We made it all the way to Tofino on the west side of the island and then came back. We went north through Saskatoon/Edmonton on the way there, and came back south via Calgary/Regina. 2 stays in Vancouver.  
 
There's a huge amount of things to do see and do on the way. A surprising number of "world's largest" attractions (which we made a point of stopping at, LOL) out west too. We had CAA plan our route out, and we stayed mostly in hotels (and a few family/friends along the way), usually my parents would plan where we were driving to that day or the next day and call ahead to book a place.

Waterton Lakes and then Glacier National Park south of the border.

kevin89 said "We drove out to the west coast this past summer via moose jaw, Lethbridge, then the crowsnest pass and the #3 highway to Vancouver. It was a great trip, we camped most of the time except the first two nights. Took our own car (Chevy cobalt) but we did see a ton of people in rented RVs. Camping is by far your most cost effective accommodation as we found that hotels in some of the places we visited were pretty expensive. "

I hope when you go to Lethbridge, you stop and enjoy Two Guys Pizza. Best pizza in town

So many choices, makes it hard to pick a place!

If you go west head out to Vancouver island it is beautiful out there!! I’ve been on lots of road trips out west growing up, to various locations both staying in hotels or camping or staying with family. I would love to do a trip out east! I flew out to Nova Scotia and PEI this past summer and would of loved more time to explore and drive our own car to drive around. It would be neat to hit up Niagara Falls (I’ve heard to go south to the states and back up then all the way through Ontario), love heard amazing things about Quebec and hit up the rest of the Atlantic provinces!!

In 2013 we drove from Brandon to Vancouver, then took the fairy from Vancouver to Victoria, then drove north up the Island to Comox. Turned around and came back to Brandon. The drive was horrifically boring until we reached Alberta. The drive home felt like it took 9 years to get home. However, we concluded that BC is truly one of the most beautiful places on Earth.

In 2013 we drove from Brandon to Vancouver, then took the fairy from Vancouver to Victoria, then drove north up the Island to Comox. Turned around and came back to Brandon. The drive was horrifically boring until we reached Alberta. The drive home felt like it took 9 years to get home. However, we concluded that BC is truly one of the most beautiful places on Earth.