A Monthlong West Coast Road Trip? Less Than $1,800.
Here we go! I packed up my life in Los Angeles and hit the road around April 1st! Now that I’m financially independent, I’ll be road tripping throughout the continental US and a bit of Canada. I’m typing this to you from the library in Port Angeles, WA after completing a monthslong West Coast road trip to almost the Canadian border; I’ll soon drive onto a ferry that will transport me to Canada, but not before compiling my road trip spending for April!
The Stops
I stopped at over 30 places! Here’s the list of where I went:
| Place | Reason/recommendation |
| Solvang | Danish-style little town, so stinking cute; I especially loved the Swedish princess cake I got here. Marzipan frosting is the best. |
| San Luis Obispo | I went primarily for the Madonna Inn! Greatest femme opulence I have ever seen, and their pink champagne cake is truly worth the hype. |
| Sequoia National Park | Incredible hiking, incredible history, and incredible sequoia trees! |
| Kings Canyon National Park | The sister national park to Sequoia right next door! |
| Castroville | The artichoke capital of the world! I ate an artichoke cupcake here that tasted like a normal cupcake. |
| Outside Fresno | Rest day here, hiking is no joke |
| Carmel by the Sea | Idyllic beach waterfront and incredible little art galleries half-hidden down gorgeous alleyways |
| Monterey | I didn’t go to the aquarium, but I did get up close to a ton of seals sunbathing by the docks! |
| Gilroy | The GARLIC capital of the world!! I tried black garlic here for the first time and also ate garlic ice cream. The ice cream has a strong garlic aftertaste, but it was tasty and I would happily eat again. |
| Stanford University, Palo Alto | The campus architecture and exhibits are simply stunning. It’s free to visit and a fascinating place. |
| San Francisco | I walked the entire Golden Gate Bridge here! I also visited Alcatraz; did you know it was reclaimed by native activists back in the 70s? Wonder why that’s not well known… |
| Sacramento | The capital of California! Their historic district looks exactly like a Wild West movie set! |
| Yosemite National Park | A friend of mine saw photos I took here and said “Those don’t even look real”. Gorgeous, gorgeous place. |
| Turlock | For a rest day and waiting out a Yosemite winter storm warning |
| Fort Bragg | Cute coastal town with great historical plaques along the waterfront and incredible beach sunsets. |
| Eureka | Known for its great Victorian architecture. Weirdly, I met a couple of people here that were cartoonishly snooty. I am still baffled by that interaction. |
| Redwoods National Park | My FAVORITE national park from this trip!!! I went on a tour co-hosted by a park ranger and a Yurok steward that taught me more than I expected. |
| Yurok Reservation | Their visitor center is an excellent stop to understand the specific history for this tribe; a display about their language almost brought me to tears. |
| Crescent City | Visited the Jedediah Smith State Park while here! |
| Eugene, OR | I wouldn’t mind living here if I were to settle down somewhere. Great college town. |
| Salem | The capital of Oregon! Surprisingly beautiful residential architecture. |
| Florence | Another coastal town with some hilarious historic episodes (hint: exploding whale and accidental ban on sex). |
| Tillamook | I visited the Tillamook Creamery. Very touristy, but I had a lot of fun! They offer free cheese samples here, and I got to try cheddars aged for 6 years and 10 years, respectively. Both had strong, rich tastes that are worth the stop alone. |
| Cannon Beach | This stop was solely for Haystack Rock, where puffins fly down to nest in the spring and summer!! |
| Astoria | The oldest city in the PNW. Very stately with lovely buildings and homes. |
| Olympia, WA | The capital of Washington State! This was one of my favorite stops with so much beauty in their downtown area. |
| Tacoma | Lots of great museums here. For lunch, I recommend a Creole spot called Chez Lafayette! |
| Seattle and Kirkland | Does Seattle need any further ado? 🙂 Highlights included a jaunt to Pike Place Market and the ube maladasa at Fuji Bakery in the International District. I also popped up to Kirkland to spend the day with Angela from Women’s Personal Finance! |
| Poulsbo | It’s a Norwegian-style town this time! It’s an adorable spot. |
| Port Townsend | Apparently, this was supposed to be the Next Big City until Seattle was crowned this instead. Now, it’s a small town with unexpectedly beautiful buildings dating back to the turn of the century. |
| Jamestown S’Klallam Indian Reservation | This was a random stop that brought me to tears. Go visit the Tribal Center and the library here. Heck, just wandering along the lakefront reading displays is worth it. I’m going to be thinking about this tribe for a long time. |
| Olympic National Park/Port Angeles | I’m here at the same time as the sun, so no cloudy days or rain for me! I took so many photos and videos from Sol Duc Falls in Olympic especially. For Port Angeles, I highly recommend their sculpture park that surrounds the fine arts center! |
Why These Places?
My top road trip interests are in history, nature, and architecture. I also like to visit the library wherever I end up, as that’s an incredibly easy barometer for measuring how much the locals value education, social services, local history/culture, overall civic duty, and their own people. The San Francisco library’s main branch was remarkably soulless, would not recommend. The best library I visited was at Jamestown; the clear care and love for community at that place freaking blew me away. This itinerary is hyper-specific to my tastes, and I remain delighted at my decision-making skills in both finances and trip-planning.
I had originally planned to move more slowly, figuring I’d hit fatigue more often like I did while working. Nope! I’m about a week ahead of what I first estimated, and definitely did not think I’d be visiting basically a new place every day!
The Financials of a Monthlong West Coast Road Trip
Now for the specific costs: I tallied up the total I’ve spent and, to my surprise, it’s less than my original planned spend of $2,000. Instead, my total April West Coast road trip costs came out to about $1,750. That’s as much as I paid in LA rent alone in 2024! Breakdown of where this money went goes as follows:
Total spent in April on road trip: $1,746.65
Categories:
Gas: $590.83
Gas was, by far, the biggest expense. My original budget for gas was made before Trump started a very ill-advised war with Iran, which caused gas prices to go up as – what comes as no surprise – Iran supplies a big chunk of oil to the US needed for gas. Which was, unfortunately, predictable. I thought gas prices might wreck my original budget. That, surprisingly, was not the case.
I think the credit for that is all due to two things: my hybrid electric car (2011 Nissan Rogue) and my driving speed rarely exceeding 60 miles per hour. I noticed on a prior road trip that 60mph was a sweet spot for conserving gas with my car; since I don’t exactly have places to be at a specific time, nor a chip on my shoulder assuaged with reckless driving, I have thus reaped the benefits.
Groceries: $275.72
My beloved Aldi is nowhere to be found in the Pacific Northwest! I was very sad about that. Instead, I’ve found solid deals at WinCo, QFC, and Grocery Outlet throughout California, Oregon, and Washington.
Restaurants: $264.61
This may be a little higher, depending on what I decide for dinner tonight. The best restaurant deal was from getting lunch with an Internet friend at Chez Lafayette in Tacoma, WA. They have a happy hour menu we ate off of that included a shrimp roll for $8! Honorable mention goes to my first time eating at Denny’s, which got me a HUGE meal for $13 courtesy of a random promotion Denny’s is doing for the new He-Man movie. I did not even know there was a He-Man movie coming out until I opened the menu and saw the special menu insert.
Car stuff: $225.84
Car insurance was $150.84 and the cheapest oil change in Crescent City was $75.
Tourist stuff: $127
Included is a National Parks pass, and a ticket to take the ferry to Alcatraz in San Francisco.
Film festival entry fees: $73.99
Still grinding with those two short films 🙂
Retail stores: $51.71
On a whim, I went into an Eddie Bauer outlet store. Turns out, they were having a huge closing sale that exact week. For less than thirty bucks, I got me a high-quality jean jacket that looks and feels great! The other $22 was from a CVS run to grab aspirin and discount Easter candy.
Old apartment bill: $64.25
This is the final electric bill from my apartment in Los Angeles.
Public transit: $45.70
Mostly for San Francisco and Seattle. I love public transit and happily paid this instead of dealing with city traffic.
Phone bill: $25
I am still with Visible. Unlimited talk/text/data for $25 and works perfect.
Accommodations: $2
Yes, the most I spent on accommodations for the whole month was two dollars (specifically, $1.96). That’s the magic of credit card points at work, price match claims, and camping every other day. This is going to go way up in May because I have officially exhausted all my credit card points for this trip; without these points, I would have spent $537. That would have brought my total spend to over $2,250. Not ideal, but still fine with my portfolio.
Pro tip: if you’re also using credit card points to book a stay, you’re almost guaranteed to find a site offering the same stay at a cheaper rate. You can then call your credit card people and ask for a price match. I’ve gotten additional credits for every single one of my stays save one using this method.
The Mental Reset of a Monthlong Road Trip
Not having to work has given me an unexpected energy boost, as aforementioned. Pre-2026, I chalked up my bouts of fatigue to a medical condition, but now it seems it was due to work! Fascinating! Even the small amount of work I had to do was unreasonably stressful, I guess! Flexibility was great not only for slowing down, as I originally expected, but for speeding up. I had so much energy for hitting the road and driving to the next place, that I’m about a week ahead of schedule.
If there’s anywhere I’m slowing down, it’s in my levels of stress and worry. If anything unfortunate happened in the last month, I have dealt it with a calm that is absent of the adrenaline spikes it would have caused a year ago.
The best example comes from the 101 in rural Oregon: there were no chickens crossing the road, but a turkey sure was. It flew in front of me as I was going 50mph and hit my windshield with a FWOMP. I screamed, saw nothing but floating feathers in the rearview mirror, and pulled off the road to check for damage. Spoiler: there was no damage to the car nor windshield, and the turkey disappeared so it wouldn’t be liable.
A year ago, I would have needed to sit for several minutes as I waited to calm down. But not this year: since no one died (including the turkey) and the car was none the worse for wear, I got right back on the road on my merry way.
What’s Ahead
Next up is trying to visit all of the other states I’ve never been to before in the continental US! If I get sick of road tripping, I’ll figure out a new plan for then. Financially speaking, I won’t mind my May expenses going over my original $2k estimate. Not with the $250 excess I got from April. Which is great, since I’m expecting my accommodation costs to be around $600 now that I’ve depleted my credit card points. Til then!
Cover image credit: ME! I took that photo at Yosemite National Park. I took all of the photos in this article!