Fort Lauderdale to New York
 

My husband and I (both 60yrs) are planning a trip to USA, and thinking of a cruise 7-10days from Fort Lauderdale and after hoping to visit New Orleans, Nashville and open to other suggestion, and then on to New York to perhaps do a land tour taking in the north. we were thinking April 2018, but not sure of the weather???
Any suggestions or ideas are welcomed, or places not to miss, as we are coming from Australia. We were thinking of about a 4-5 weeks.

Many thanks
Pachet

You might want to repost this question on the "US Forum" - use the "Change Forum" dropdown menu at the top of this page to select "United States".

To answer your weather question - April is Spring time in the US so generally "weather" is good but since you are planning a 4 to 5 week trip covering a significant part of the country you'll probably encounter a variety of "weather" conditions.

You can research general weather conditions for any location at www.weatherbase.com - select the country then cities you'll be visiting and you'll find out things like average daily temperatures, average monthly rainfall, number of rain days, etc.

If you want more detailed weather statistics go to www.wunderground.com - enter the city you wish to research in the search box. On the new page scroll down to the History & Almanac section and enter your planned dates of travel. Drill down and you'll find all sorts of weather charts including one showing what actual weather conditions were in that location for every day during that period over the last 10 years. If you study the data you'll know more about the weather in that location than most locals.

I cannot thank you enough for your help and advise.
Pachet

If by "land tour taking in the north", you mean including the New England states, if you can come a little later in the spring-time (May or even June) you will most likely have much better weather for that portion of the trip.

Travel time is not limited to April, so thanks for your suggestion.

You are considering places quite far apart, but coming from Australia, perhaps distance is not an issue for you. You just have to allow enough time and money for travel inbetween.

As to your cruise, I assume you want the Caribbean. Look at cruises from Miami too. It is very close to Ft Lauderdale and easy to get to. Strongly suggest you also consider a cruise out of San Juan, Puerto Rico because many really good cruises go from there. They go further south and see more interesting islands.

Before suggesting places, have you been to the US before? If so, where did you go? Is your interest more historical places, scenery, culture, art, etc? What attracts you to NO and Memphis? Assume you will be arriving via the West Coast? Do you want to fly into Florida and out of New York or perhaps Boston or Washington DC?

March and early April is a great time for a cruise.
April and May is beautiful in the Southern States, the Carolinas, etc.
In the New England states, April can still be cold, even snow in places, but by May, it is lovely. So, Cruise, South, then North works well.

Sassafrass, your suggestions are wonderful. We have been to the major city of the west, Alaska, Rockies, Los Vegas, New York and Chicago ( NY & C but many years ago ) yes historical places do interest us. Perhaps we would also like to include Washington. Thought we could do a land tour of the north, with extra days in NY, any suggestions of tour companies please.


Pachet