Where to go....
Hi there....
My partner and I are currently in Toronto Canada and are planning a road trip back to Vancouver via the states. We're really interested in seeing the "musical" towns of the states, ie, Nashville, Memphis, New Orleans etc. Any tips on where to go and what to see? We're trying to do it on the cheap too, so any tips about where to stay or how to do this cheaply would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks,
TaraT
Reply to this In my humble opinion, depending on your music preferences, Austin Texas, KC Missouri, St Louis Missouri, San Francisco CA, Portland Oregon, Dallas TX, Minneapolis MN, Seattle WA. Are some of the best cities that aren't on the East side of the country. I play in a band that tours a fair amount so hopefully that is helpfully at least.
Reply to this I have built a site for travelling in California called
http://www.bestofcalifornia.info/ . THere are many articles about different California destinations for each of the major cities. THis is not a plug, just help from my side. Thank you
Reply to this I would highly recommend going to Memphis. I just got back from there, and it was fantastic; Beale Street and the surrounding area has so much history. You can stay in Arkansas or Mississppi for a fraction of the cost, just right over the state line if you don't mind driving into the downtown area during the day. Nashville, and New Orleans are also great places to catch some music, as is Austin, as someone else has suggested. I'd also suggest, if you can, getting up to Chicago. There are some great bands that come through the venues there, a lot of variety of genres, and you could potentially see a lot of up and coming groups.
Reply to this If you want to know where to go in in North America then check out http://www.shoptravellive.com and go to their destination guides. I planned my whole trip to Rockport, TX right on their site.
Reply to this Another tip- join www.couchsurfing.com. It's a travelers' community where you can set up a profile and search for people all over the world to stay with while you're visiting somewhere. They put you up for free, all you have to do is email them and see if they are available. That way, you get a local's perspective on where to go, and what to do. It's a great way to travel- my husband and I are traveling through the US in our school bus right now and have couchsurfed with about 6 amazing hosts so far. Can't imagine ever paying for a room again!
Reply to this Thanks heaps everyone! We did our road trip - Nashville, Memphis, The Great Plains, the California coast! It was awesome!
Thanks for all your words of advice! TT
Reply to this Hey Tara, Im planning something similar, tell me how long did you go and how you budgeted things out?
Reply to this Hey - it took us about 3 1/2 weeks. We didn't live on the super cheap, so it ended up costing about $4K I think. That includes accommodation, fuel, food, recreation. We figured it out before we left by calculating how far our car travelled per tank of gas (we got a nice surprise because highway driving used much less fuel than we thought) and we estimated what we'd spend each day including what average nightly hotel rate we would be happy with. We used expedia.com to book our hotels - they have very cheap rates. Hope this helps!
Reply to this Hey all,
I don't know if this is a well known tip or not, but usually I use expedia.com to find the hotels I think are the top choices for me (usually in some combination of cost/location), and then go to the actual hotel's website to book the rooms. It takes a bit more work, but nine times out of ten I usually find I can save a few bucks a night since I won't be paying expedia's booking fee or whatever it is (maybe some of you don't mind, but I'm a college girl and when you're living out of hotels for a week and a half on spring break... I'd rather save the extra 50 bucks). Just some food for thought.
😊
Reply to this Moreover, most of the time you can cancel your booking for no fee when you book directly, which is not always the case when you book with Expedia :-)
Reply to this Good tips! Strange though, because the reason we used expedia.com was because it was usually always cheaper than going to the hotel's website direct. By a lot. Maybe it was the type of hotels we were staying at. They weren't flash - places like Days Inn or Holiday Inn etc.
I guess it pays to check both out and see which one is offering the best deal.
The cancelling tip is a good point.
Reply to this There is a no-fee hotel booking engine at www.maine.info/sandbox/maps/map2.php ... It started in Maine (and has restaurants and reviews there) but also has hotel booking throughout the USA. Again, there is no fee, and the use of the Map & Directions is helpful. I hate fees too.
Reply to this Another non-booking fees site is www.tramazing.com
I compare few website booking and found this can view cheap rates
Reply to this 
