From chicago to San francisco which route?
 

Hi from Switzerland- We are planning to drive next June or so from Chicago to San Francisco. this year we drove from Saint Louis to L.A. route 66. Which Route should we take? Thank you for any help Gaia

Hi, could you give us a bit more information?

How much time do you have?

What are you interested in?

Are you into hiking? nightlife? photography?

The easiest and fastest is to go straight across on Intertate 80, but you may want to do something different dependent on your intersts.

We did basically that trip just a few months ago. Click on my name to see the trip report.

I-80 to the Colorado border, I-76 to I-70 through Denver and the mountains west would provide a more scenic route than I-80 through Wy.

Even in late June/early July, you can run into snowstorms in the mountains. Exact time of year will help determine your route. Be sure to rent a car with good traction, just in case. You don't need an SUV, but get front-wheel drive at the very least, AWD even better.

Fmpden's route above is beautiful, so you could get a good feel for Colorado.

We chose I-80 last time we drove to San Francisco, simply because we live in Colorado and wanted to see more of Utah and Nevada. Lots of wide open spaces (some might be bored by those vistas, but it depends on your interests). We spent one night in Park City, another two nights in Lake Tahoe.

If it is late Jne or early July and you have at least 2 weeks I'd go a more northern route...If you want interstates,look at I-35 to I-94 is Wisconsin and then I-94 across Minnesota, North Dakota ad Montana, connecting to I-90 at Billings and then to Seattle and finally I-5 south to the Bay Area.
If you are looking to avoid intestates, look at taking US 2 across the northern tier of states at Wasington. Alternatively leave US 2 in Montana to visit Glacier Nat. Park and then south to Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons and the so-called Loneliest Road US 50 (roughly parallels the Pony Express route in NV) across Utah and Nevada into Scaramento then I-80. IMO I-80 except from Salt Lake City to Saramento is the interesting route across the country.

thank you for your answers. We have 3 weeks and perhaps a little longer. We do not want to go during school holidays.boom_boom,s route seems fine to us. I take a lot of photos. Nearly professional and am crazy about it. We have a relative living 3 hours from Billigs,MO who we have only seen here in Switzerland, and we have never been to Salt Lake City. The last time we wanted to go there,it started snowing in Arizona and we had to turn south. That was in October, quite a time ago.

I-80 across to San Francisco is probably the shortest route. A nice route would be I-90 through southern Minnesota, South Dakota, Montana, Idaho. Then drop down on 395 to I-84 - it goes along the Columbia River gorge and is a beautiful drive. From Portland, Oregon drive to the Pacific Coast and then drive down 101 to San Francisco.

There is so much to see along this route.