Right here at HoneyTrek, we completely LOVE highway journeys. The truth is, we now have highway tripped by all 50 US States (to not point out numerous Canadian Provinces, Mexican states, and practically 100 nations). The sensation of cruising down the backroads of America, home windows down, strong tunes on the radio…that’s a vibe!
Beneath you’ll find our favourite USA highway journeys. If you wish to dig deeper into any of those places, simply click on the photograph or the textual content hyperlink that claims “take me on this highway journey.”
We lived in New Jersey for 11 years, however after this 7-day highway journey, we realized how a lot we had taken without any consideration. Nicknamed the Backyard State, it boasts quite a few outside leisure alternatives, together with 130 miles of seashores, 12 nationwide park websites, and the primary nationwide reserve. It’s the one state within the US the place all of the counties are thought of metropolitan areas, so you’re by no means shy of wonderful eating, cultural happenings, and issues to do.
And did we point out it’s the Diner Capital of the World? You’re in for some good eats! Too usually, folks decide New Jersey by what they see from the turnpike…however hop on the backroads, observe our journey information beneath, and also you’ll see {that a} New Jersey Highway Journey is stuffed with implausible and surprising issues to do.
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Do you know that Orlando is America’s most-visited trip vacation spot? Individuals, a Florida highway journey has a lot extra going for it than amusement parks! Extra freshwater springs than anyplace on the earth, the one and solely Everglades, the oldest European metropolis within the U.S., a melting pot of cultures from across the globe, and seaside climate when a lot of the States is shoveling snow…why wouldn’t we spend our winter right here? We put aside one month to highway journey the Sunshine State, from the southernmost level to the northwestern border, and uncover the locations much more magical than Disney.
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After 3.5 years and 74,000 miles of road-tripping round North America, we’ve reached our Fiftieth State! We began this grand USA highway journey in April 2017, ventured in every single place from the Arctic Circle to the Florida Keys, and have lastly made it to the Nice Lakes state of Wisconsin! With Lake Superior, Lake Michigan, and 15,000 different lakes scattered round WI, they’re identified for his or her freshwater adventures, however we shortly realized that’s only the start.
They’ve an Worldwide Darkish Sky Park, billion-year-old rock formations, a 1,200-mile mountaineering path, IMBA-ranked mountain biking, and extra fruit and veggie farms than a vegan might dream of. For our Fiftieth-state celebration, we went huge and partnered with Journey Wisconsin for a 1,300-mile, two-week highway journey across the state—in peak fall foliage, no much less! We had an absolute blast and are excited to share our must-see stops for the final word Wisconsin highway journey.
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Tennessee! Not solely is that this state dwelling to The Nice Smoky Mountains, their famed whiskey, and the birthplace of nation music, blues, & rock n’ roll, nevertheless it’s additionally dwelling to nearly all of Anne’s household! With aunts, uncles, and cousins on one facet of the state and our siblings and nieces on the opposite, this known as for a cross-state highway journey! Tennessee has 16 self-guided driving routes connecting 95 counties, plus Tennessee Music Pathways, tracing the state’s music historical past and legends. With loads of inspiration for our route, we zigzagged from Knoxville to Memphis and found so many fantastic off-the-beaten-path locations.
On our 10-day Tennessee highway journey, we have been struck by the amount of historic little cities discovering their mojo. From the previous mining boomtown of Monterey to the faculty city of Cookeville, locals all talked in regards to the current inflow of inventive folks and hip companies turning their sleepy cities round. Tennessee appears to breed and appeal to creative folks, and its cities are proud to have fun them. We stumbled upon so many festivals, artwork workshops, free concert events, and neighborhood occasions that endeared us to those locations much more.
See our favourite issues to do throughout the state and begin planning your personal Tennessee highway journey!
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“So, you two are in Chicago and driving to LA…are you gonna take Route 66?” My dad posed this query, and we felt foolish that taking the nation’s most iconic highway journey hadn’t even crossed our minds. We had simply hit our Fiftieth state, and the Primary Avenue of America was an excellent homecoming. Zigzagging 2,448 miles throughout eight states, it’s a freeway many people have pushed on–whether or not we’ve identified it or not.
It was decommissioned in 1985 and slowly paved over by main interstates or bypassed fully, placing lots of its gems off the overwhelmed observe. Although that’s the great thing about the Mom Highway, it’s a treasure hunt reserved for these with a way of journey and an appreciation for the previous. Keep the course and also you’ll be rewarded with neon motel indicators, traditional automobiles, glass-tank fuel pumps, hole-in-the-wall diners, and the fantastic folks conserving the spirit of the highway alive.
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The Grand Circle highway journey is like wrapping the perfect of the Southwest’s nationwide park system up in a bow. Historic volcanic mountains, protruding plateaus and buttes, and deeply carved canyons reveal themselves in a rainbow of colours. Civilizations courting again hundreds of years, adopted by the Navajo, Apache, Spanish, Mormons, crystal readers, and adrenaline junkies have created a multicultural combine distinctive to this a part of the world. The Colorado Plateau has the densest focus of nationwide parks within the US and this Grand Circle tour connects the perfect of them.
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Everybody is aware of about iconic US highway journeys…just like the Pacific Coast Freeway or Route 66…however hugging the curves of the Cascade Vary? This Oregon highway journey has simply been one in all our favourite legs on our 130,000-mile journey across the States. Throughout the Pacific Ring of Fireplace and operating from Northern California to southern British Columbia, this mountain vary is beautiful throughout the board.
Although to deal with it with out crampons or a month of trip time, we’d vote for the Oregon route between Ashland and Terrebonne. Spunky cities, glaciated mountains, excessive desert, craft beer nation, and extra journey than an adrenaline junkie is aware of what to do with, our Oregon Highway Journey by this slice of the Cascade Vary has all of it.
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“Please shut the gate behind you; don’t let the cows out,” mentioned the word subject on our back-country tenting app. We shut it behind us and inched down the filth highway, hoping the heifers would clear a path. “May this actually be the way in which?” I mentioned to Mike. We rounded the bend, and a river flowing round a rippled mountain with dashes of crimson and purple appeared, with a wonderfully stage campsite. It was one of many prettiest we’d seen in our first 500 days of our USA highway journeys, and nobody was round. This was the theme of our Idaho highway journey: magnificence below the radar.
For instance, they don’t have any nationwide parks, although once you’re going by Patagonia-style mountain ranges with 40 peaks over 10,000 toes or rafting the deepest river gorge in North America, it appears the Nationwide Park Service will need to have made a mistake. And even crazier, this attractive state is generally identified for its potatoes! One thing needed to give…so we set the document straight with a month-long Idaho highway journey. Listed below are our highlights from 1,500+ miles by the wildly underrated Gem State.
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“I had a dream of RVing Alaska,” mentioned our mechanic and camper namesake, Buddy. With a slew of well being points, work, and grandbabies conserving him near dwelling, this forlorn 72-year-old man instilled an Alaskan wanderlust in us from our first day of RV possession. We needed to do an Alaska highway journey for him and ourselves, we simply didn’t know if this 1985 four-cylinder relic might make the arduous journey. Two summers of road-tripping glided by, and, save for the southernmost ghost city of Hyder, the Final Frontier evaded us.
We’ll admit, it sounded intimidatingly far, rugged, huge, and out of our league, however you by no means know till you strive. Making an attempt to present Buddy the Camper the perfect odds, we received new tires, a brake job, and a full tune-up…and by July seventh, we have been heading in direction of the Alaska Freeway. Scaling the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia and braving the unpaved roads of the Yukon, Buddy took the gradual and regular method. However after driving to the bottom of glaciers, boondocking on riverbanks, and blazing the gravel path into the Arctic Circle, Buddy received the race.
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Everybody needs to go to Glacier Nationwide Park…like 3 million folks a yr. However what many park-goers don’t notice is that the majority of Western Montana was carved by the identical glacial exercise, providing so many different beautiful mountains, lakes, rivers, and forests, with a fraction of the vacationers. To assist extra folks discover the lesser-known gems and preserve them pristine, we took our expertise as off-grid RVers with a inexperienced coronary heart and partnered with Glacier Nation Tourism for a Montana highway journey.
Over the course of 12 days, we traveled from the Bitterroot Mountains to the far north of Kootenai County, by three nationwide forests, dynamic Native American territories, charming small cities, the largest freshwater lake within the West, and a ton extra in between. Listed below are a few of our favourite Western Montana highway journey locations and the methods you may go away these locations higher than you discovered them.
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Who’s received a pal who moved to Colorado just lately? Nearly everybody…as a result of it’s superior. It’s a state the place mountains erupt from the earth with crimson cliffs, snowy peaks, and sand dunes. Cities are as cosmopolitan as they’re granola, with bankers leaving work early to hit the mountain bike trails and farm-to-table waiters serving to maintain their ski behavior. Coloradans have gotten it discovered, between pure magnificence, nice climate, and a wholesome way of life that leaves room for a number of craft beers.
We’re completely blissful as nomads, however cities like Denver, Fort Collins, and Steamboat Springs had us trying up actual property. We drove over 1,200 miles, zigzagging in each route, and the state by no means ceased to amaze. We didn’t imply to be on a Colorado highway journey for 2 months, however try our favourite locations and adventures, and also you’ll see why it was so exhausting to depart.
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The California Gold Rush modified the nation endlessly. 300,000 folks got here from throughout the US and each nook of the world to strike it wealthy. Dozens of cities sprang up in a single day in what was as soon as the backwaters of Mexico, sparsely populated with Native People. Whereas the 1849 Gold Rush had horrible penalties for the indigenous folks, a truth that may’t be overstated, the Rush is what gave California its basis as essentially the most numerous state within the nation, its entrepreneurial spirit, and its love of journey.
To get again to California’s Wild West roots and lots of of my favourite locations as a Cali child, we took a three-week Gold Nation highway journey! CA Freeway 49 winds by the Sierra Nevadas, connecting dozens of Nineteenth-century Gold Rush cities from Yosemite Nationwide Park to north of Lake Tahoe. So, along with historic websites, this route serves up attractive mountains, raging rivers, alpine lakes, and wine nation for a visit that’s received all of it!
See our information for the perfect issues to do in Gold Nation, California, and prepare for top-of-the-line USA highway journeys!
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Higher Peninsula Highway Journey
For over a century in Michigan’s Higher Peninsula, it was wilderness vs. trade. Mining, logging, and delivery dominated by the Sixties, however the UP has reemerged as the attractive place it was meant to be and with battle scars that make it even cooler. The ruins of copper smelters crumble with the rocky shorelines, overgrown railroads seem deep within the forest, and shipwrecks add a way of thriller to its Nice Lakes.
The world’s largest freshwater lake by quantity, Superior whips up some wild wind and waves, carving attractive cliffs and churning up gem stones. Agates are in every single place and florescent sodalite had us looking the seashores till 3am. Going snorkeling, we weren’t on the lookout for fish; the lake has rocks as colourful as coral and even sunken treasure to be discovered. And perhaps what we beloved most in regards to the UP is the folks’s satisfaction for this place.
Once we instructed our Fb followers we have been occurring an Higher Peninsula highway journey, feedback poured in like we introduced a visit to the moon. Anybody vaguely from the Midwest and past, chimed in with favourite hikes, must-try sandwiches, secret tenting spots, and unforgettable moments…and now we’re simply as proud to share our personal UP tales and suggestions with you.
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Nevada Highway Journey: Loneliest Highway in America
Don’t let the title “Loneliest Highway in America” idiot you. Nevada’s Freeway 50 has been a serious thoroughfare for the reason that Pony Specific linked the West. And when mail by horse light with the daybreak of the telegraph and car, the route blazed a brand new path as the primary transcontinental freeway, from New York to San Francisco. We’ll admit that we thought Route 66 held that declare to fame, however the Lincoln Freeway got here first, and Nevada’s part was a lynchpin to guiding vacationers by the desert and over the Sierra Nevada mountains.
Why is Nevada’s Freeway 50 known as “The Loneliest Highway in America”? In 1986, Life Journal did a function, damning this 287-mile stretch, saying, “There aren’t any factors of curiosity,” and warned that motorists would wish “survival abilities” to make it by this excessive desert. Properly, as seasoned highway trippers who’ve pushed the Alaska Freeway, the whole thing of The Mom Highway, and 9 cross-country highway journeys, we knew higher than to let some persnickety editor preserve us or Nevada down! We’d taken a chunk out of The Loneliest Highway in America on earlier Nevada journeys and have been excited to lastly drive its full size and discover all its wonders with an eight-day highway journey!
Comply with our Route 50 Highway Survival Information from Nice Basin Nationwide Park, by eight historic cities to quite a few scorching springs, sacred Native American websites, sand dunes, sagebrush saloons, and so many stops to make The Loneliest Highway in America a bucket-list highway journey.
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North Florida Highway Journey
We thought we’d do our North Florida Highway Journey for perhaps three weeks…it changed into practically six! And we didn’t lollygag anyplace both; we explored 36 totally different areas, and distinctive they have been…from white sand seashores to swamps, springs, islands, savanna, hardwood hammocks, villages, and numerous “capitals” of the world. It is a little bit of a Florida phenomenon; it’s dwelling to the world capital of…manatees, sponges, shark bites, springs, cigars, horses, lightning–you title it. There are numbers to again up these claims, however you’ve additionally gotta credit score the gusto of Floridians. They’re pleased with the wonders they’ve and, as semi-resident explorers of Florida this winter, we really feel that satisfaction too.
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SLO CAL Highway Journey
We’ve pushed Central California’s jaw-dropping part of the Pacific Coast Freeway a number of instances, however by no means gave San Luis Obispo County the credit score it deserves. Midway between LA and San Francisco, it’s the guts of the Central Coast however usually overshadowed by its big-city neighbors and legendary ocean highway. We’ve even hopped out to wildlife watch at their unbelievable elephant seal colony, gawk on the ultra-luxe Hearst Fort, and marvel on the volcanic Morro Rock jutting out of the ocean, however didn’t notice so many gems we’re hiding on this SLO CAL Highway Journey.
This California highway journey was going to be totally different. In partnership with the San Luis Obispo County tourism board, we devoted 10 days to find its vibrant little cities, seaside cities, wine nation, farmers markets, mountaineering trails, artwork displays, and down-to-earth folks. Confirmed to be one of many happiest and healthiest locations on Earth, the county seat of San Luis Obispo is among the many few cities on the earth to be designated a Nationwide Geographic “Blue Zone.” Why do its folks stay longer with fewer well being issues? Take a look at our article “SLO CAL: Better of California’s Central Coast” and see what the nice life is product of!
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