Road trip from Sacramento to Canada 10-12 days
 

This will be our first long road trip with our kids and I am thinking about going to Canada, I need help or any good ideas, we will be starting from Sacramento going to Canada, places to see on the way, places to stay not so expensive hotels but descent and good places to eat, we will be driving our SUV Tahoe.Any ideas will be appreciated.

How many days in your vacation do you have? How far east were you planning to go?

Though I know you want to go to Canada, I recommend a route that takes you through the Badlands in South Dakota, and though I've never been, Yellowstone National Park. I'm not sure what age your kids are, but I'm quite certain they would enjoy both of these places.

If you go far enough east, you might all enjoy Niagara Falls as well.

For cheap hotel accomodations, I recommend using Priceline or Hotwire to book your rooms.

OP said she wants to go to CANADA in 10 to 12 days driving so you suggest S. Dakota? And Niagara Falls is out.

How far east in Canada do you want to go?
Vancouver is a great city to visit.
It might be cheaper to take the Coast Starlight to Vancouver than driving the Tahoe depending on the gas mileage.

I just now noticed the amount of the days your trip will be in the subject line. If you were considering driving east, I would still opt for going through S. Dakota rather than the Canadian provinces.

If not, driving up the coast to visit Vancouver would be nice, and then perhaps over to Calgary.

Big Mama, Canada is bigger than the USA. If you could tell us where in Canada you are thinking of going, perhaps we could advise you better.

What kinds of activities and sights do you like? Vancouver is a really nice City with a great downtown - ocean on one side, mountains framing the distance on the other side, lots of forested parks in and around the city. From there you could take the car Ferry over to Vancover Island. Once on the Island, in addition to the very nice small city of Victoria (popular with tourists) there are mountains and wild ocean vistas and tracts of ancient temperate rainforest (if these are of interest, look into Pacific Rim National Park and the town of Tofino).

The National Parks in the Canadian Rockies - e.g. Banff - are spectacular and popular, although a farther drive. Most National Parks are very popular in summer and you would probably want to book accommodation ahead for July/August (and for weekends at any time of year). What time of year are you planning this trip for?

Thank you all for your response, I will be coming from Sacramento and far East will be too far.Maximum of 12 days we can be on a road trip. I would like to see popular places which will be on the West side ( California). I have never been in Canada, so I am really not familiar with different paces there. I have a 19 yrs. old , 10 and 4 yrs. old.My Tahoe does 22-28 miles /gallon.How many days do you think I need to spend in Canada? Because I am planning also to go to Oregon and check out the place as well( popular places).I would need to know also how many days I need to spend in Oregon before going to Canada. We are planning to go from end of May -2nd week of June.

Twelve days isn't a long time, especially for driving. Google maps is a great resource for determing travel times/distances: http://maps.google.com

Why did you choose Canada? Your motivation may help in giving suggestions as to what you should see/do. Also, I would suggest you do some research first on Canada. Start with this website: http://www.fodors.com/world/north-america/canada/

Once you have some ideas of potential places/activities, we can help you with specifics.

I'll give this one my best shot: Sacramento to Corvallis, OR to Vancouver, BC two days? Vancouver to Jasper Alberta over the Yellowhead Highway 9 hours drive time plus a stop or two.
I like the hostel SW of town but you may want to stay in downtown Jasper 2 days? The Icefield Highway through Banff to Calgary Alberta. Calgary to Sandpoint Idaho. Sandpoint through Spokane and south to Bend Oregon. If you still have the time, stop and see Crater Lake on the way home. Total miles~3000
Total hours of driving 53, Gallons of gas 140 for about $550.
I'm sure others will say go to Victoria from Vancouver. If you have the extra time take the ferry and do it.

First of all, make sure evvvvvvvvverybody in your party has the right documentation to cross the border into Canada. Basically that means "passports" in this day and age, unless California has some sort of an "enhanced driver's license" which works for the purpose of Canada (as well as Mexico)???

Beyond that, you should probably drive straight north without too many diversions on the way up, and then save various Oregon detours for the way back.

With "10 or 12 days", you will have 'enough time', but it won't be difficult to fill your itinerary.

Wild suggestion:

night one: northern Oregon
night two: northern Washington
nights 3-5: Vancouver

nights 6-7: Seattle

nights 8-9: Oregon coast???
night 10: enroute back home
(detour inland to Crater Lake, maybe??)


With that or something like it as a backbone, you could pick and choose various attractions to see and do.

Vancouver itself is awesome, particularly as a first visit to "Canada". It will feel a tiny bit 'foreign' without bringing any of the pitfalls of most truly "FOREIGN" destinations.

Hope this helps.

Well, my DH and I drove from Sacramento to the border straight driving...never again...but since you don't want to do that.... :)

you asked "How many days do you think I need to spend in Canada?" Not a fair question, since you can spend either spend 10 days there (with 2 days driving there and back), or you can spend as little as one night in Vancouver.

I think NorthWestMale gave the best type of itinerary....

But, really, it seems like a really long drive to only spend 2 nights in Vancouver...you wouldn't even have scratched the surface (never mind your brain being fried from all the driving).

I would suggest either really pushing through to Vancouver and spending a good 5-6 days here and the driving back with a stop off in Oregon...or just skipping Vancouver in general and staying on the Oregon coast.

day 1 - stop north Oregon
Day 2 - stay in Seattle
Day 3-9 - stay in Vancouver (if your super ambitious 1 night in Whistler). day trip to Bowen Island or a Gulf Island.
Day 10-11 - Oregon
Day 11 - Home


No way you can make it to the Rockies in that amount of time...you would just see British Columbia through your front car window.

Oh, and definitely make sure you have passports for everyone in your family (and they are all valid and don't expire for at least six months). Just as US customs are sticklers now for documents, so is the CDN border agency.

In all fairness, my itinerary had "3" nights in Vancouver... and while Vancouver to Portland is 300-ish miles and a border crossing, so indeed "do-able" in one day, it still puts a lot of pressure on somebody who by your itinerary will have had just one previous night in Seattle.


At any rate, the whole trip as conceived by the OP is quite do-able, and I think she should stick to 'Vancouver' as being a fine representation of "Canada" for this purpose.

The route I outlined above:
Day 1 Sacramento to Albany, Oregon :- 8.3 hours
Day 2 Albany OR to Vancouver BC :- 7.3 hours
Days 3 & 4 in around Vancouver
Day 5 Vancouver BC to Jasper AB :- 8.8 hours (500 miles)
Days 6 & 7 around Jasper
8 Jasper-Banff-Calgary 5.2 hours plus stops
Day 9 Calgary to Sandpoint,
ID 7.3Hours
Day 10 Sandpoint to Bend, OR 8.0
Day 11 Bend to Crater Lake 2.5 hours CL to SAC 6.5
54 hours divided among 7 driving days 4 tourist/rest days.
If you go with a 12th day, spend it in Vancouver/Victoria.
You can hit Seattle on another shorter trip.

That last suggestion entails not far from 1000 miles in Canada, where gas costs more, and by the end of May, gas prices will likely be higher than they are now.


A mere round-trip from Sacramento to Vancouver, Canada is about 1800 miles, and the young'ns will probably want to spend more time "doing" than merely seeing from the road.

Besides, the 19yo will want time to go out drinking in Canada, where the drinking age is "19" !!!

The Vancouver, BC social scene far eclipses that of anything else in BC or Alberta.

Limiting the trip to Vancouver and immediate surrounds affords more time for seeing various spots along the way, while also allowing for "kid" stuff to take up some of the time.

FYI, the drinking age in parts of Canada (including BC) is 19. In other parts (including Alberta) it's 18.