My wife and I are visiting Califonia during February/March. We are flying in to Los Angeles. Our plan is to either hire a car or use bus transportation. We hope to include San Francisco and Las Vegas.

I have heard it is possible to return rented cars to their source, for example L.A. to F.S. without cost to myself. Has anyone information on this?

This will be our first trip to Califonia so we will be grateful for any useful information that would make a nice holiday for us.

We are especially interested in hearing about inexpensive, clean hotels. .

Whether or not you rent a car is 100% dependent on which city your are planning to spend most of your time in. San Francisco is one of the best cities in the US for those without cars; Los Angeles is BY FAR the worst (perhaps, for its size, the worst in the world). There is no way you can really visit Los Angeles without a car, period. SOOO, if you're planning on seeing LA, you MUST rent a car.

Some car rental companies have no drop off charges when renting in one city in California and returning it in another; others tack on substantial charges. Check with your travel agent.

For inexpensive motels in California (or anywhere in the US), check out

www.motel6.com
www.super8.com
www.daysinn.com
www.travelodge.com

I would agree with the above recommendation that if you plan to spend a significant amount of time in Los Angeles, a car is absolutely necessary. I would also recommend car transportation to your other destinations over bus. I know that National Car Rental does not charge extra for a different drop off site, so perhaps you can check them first. As for useful information, try searching this site with the keyword "California" and you should come up with quite a few informative postings. If those don't quite cover what you want, ask some specific questions and we'll be glad to help you out!

Personally, having toured areas, including California, by car and bus, my choice would always be by car as this leaves your schedule open to do what you want to do, when you want to do it, not at the schedule set by the bus company, making stops when the driver wants to stop, where he wants to stop, etc. You just have much more flexibility and make better time in by driving on your own.

As the others have stated, some car rentals allow you to pick up in one place, drop off in another with or without charges. Check with various car rental agents to get your best deal or have your travel agent do it.

On our last trip to CA, we were supposed to fly in to Palm Springs, but an aborted flight to our destination caused us to have to be routed through LA first. Our rental car was scheduled for Palm Springs, but even with a last-minute phone call to the rental agency, they graciously changed our reservation to pick up in LA so we could drive to Palm Springs and we were able to leave the car in Palm Springs upon our departure w/o a charge.

You should definitely include San Diego in your travels. San Diego and San Francisco are the two of the best cities in the country to visit. I would also try to make a trip to Las Vegas. Las Vegas is spsectacular and offers a lot whether you gamble or not. Weather will play a part in some of the things you may or not be able to do. Feb/Mar. are in the rainy season for the weather is rather unpredictable. It could be very nice or rainy.

You may want to try looking at the 'Travel Web' site for accomodations in the various locales. Their URL is:

www.travelweb.com