Road Trip along the Mother Road of America

2500 km in 6 days on a Convertible Mustang through 5 states

I was wrong about American road trips. They are truly therapeutic. I’ve never imagined bare rocks to be this beautiful. It was like driving through a wallpaper, a new wallpaper every 5 minutes for hours and hours. Landscapes go from desert to snow to the surface of Mars within 30 minutes. Our itinerary is as follows. I will be posting about each in detail.

Day 1: Fly to Vegas, rent car, Mojave Desert camping Day 2: Death Valley National Park Day 3: Las Vegas Day 4: Hoover Dam, Snowy Grand Canyon Day 5: Monument Valley, Navajo Nation Day 6: Snowy Sandia Peak, Return car @ Santa Fe Day 7: Santa Fe & Fly back from Albuquerque

Before the trip, we pulled 4 all-nighters in a week to finish projects, exams and extra workshops, caught the flight to Vegas, and started the week-long road trip during a week-long spring break. We had booked the cheapest car, but we found its price + deposit + tax was above our $1000 credit limit. So they offered an “even cheaper car, but may not fit all three of you” which, to our surprise, was a Ford Mustang.

We mostly followed Historic Route 66, also called the Mother Road or Main Road of America. It is a scenic route that starts in Chicago and ends in Santa Monica (pier) of Los Angeles. We crossed 5 states: Nevada (Vegas, Hoover Dam), California (Mojave, Death Valley), Arizona (Grand Canyon), Utah (Monument Valley), and New Mexico (Abq, Santa Fe). We also drove through the Navajo Nation, the largest Native American semi-sovereign reservation.