New to cross country towing

It's an 18 hour drive empty? Add a couple few hours for slower towing. That's about how long it will take.......

Add more if your trailer pooches a tire or bearing or you hit head winds in an under powered tow rig.

We've driven three 12 hour days in a row. Regularly drive 6 - 11 hours in a day. An 18 - 20 hour trip I would break into 2 days. My preferable method is to leave about 3;00 a.m. and stop by mid afternoon.

The important thing is to know your personal limits, driving once you're fatigued can be dangerous to you and others. Up until this year, when we retired, the destination rather than the journey was the objective most of the time. When possible we would often depart around 2 or 3am, and drive 800 to as much as 1000 miles on a few occasions. We would only do the long runs when we could be at the destination in the single day, and leaving early and arriving late wasn't an issue.

Bipeflier wrote:
We are retired and are far from spring chickens but when I hit the road, say for Colorado, I consider 500 miles a "normal" day. That is typically about 9 hours of driving. Not beat when we arrive and we see no reason to stop mid-afternoon to sit in some campground waiting for bed time.

FWIW we also tour on our motorcycle and we still do many 600 mile days as we enjoy riding the bike.

Do what is comfortable for you.

That's bout what we do, but it really depends upon the weather, traffic, how late we partied the night before. plus, some days we take a side trip to see what we can see.

As you can see, everyone has their own comfort level on the number of hours to drive each day. For us, we try not to travel more than 400 miles per day. If it is all highway driving, we will go to 450 but prefer not to. We figure we average about 50 mph with fuel, food and stretch stops so that is an 8 hour day. We want to get to the RV park when it is still light.

We are retired and are far from spring chickens but when I hit the road, say for Colorado, I consider 500 miles a "normal" day. That is typically about 9 hours of driving. Not beat when we arrive and we see no reason to stop mid-afternoon to sit in some campground waiting for bed time.

FWIW we also tour on our motorcycle and we still do many 600 mile days as we enjoy riding the bike.

Do what is comfortable for you.

I've had 18 wheelers stack up behind me on I-5 and listen to them ***** about G/pa in the motorhome blocking traffic. then they will get in the left lane and try to pass. and just set there and soon there are 50 cars wanting to pass and can't.
Washington and Oregon are no better. Wa. law says 60 mph for all vehicles over 10,000# or in combination. and the highways are posted no trucks in left lane. in many urban areas.

Highway #2 and #20 there are many places that I can not run 65, even with out the towed. simply too many curves, or hills. but I will use the passing lanes.

OutdoorPhotographer wrote:

Tom/Barb wrote:


Even at 70 your a hazard to higher speed traffic.

Most of the truckers drive 70, when they can.

Depends on where in CA. Big state. All I can speak for is I-5 or 99 in Central Valley but truckers tended to hover near the 55 towing limit and so did I. Truck flow made me less conspicuous towing but yes, it was a hazard with a line of trucks in right lane going 30 mph slower than flow of traffic. Created problem for someone not towing who wants to drive speed limit +/- 5 mph. Slow down to 55, bob and weave to stay the speed limit, or get run over. I don't miss it.

The 55 MPH speed limit was not established/approved for reasons of safety but rather a means to conserve fuel consumption years ago. I prefer not to drive behind a series of 18 wheel trucks who tend to tail gate each other and I don't really have a good line of sight of what the traffic is ahead of me. I will hunker down behind an 18 wheeler when the winds are blowing around the 25 MPH range for a smoother ride. I drive 62 to 64 MPH where it is safe to do so.

Tom/Barb wrote:


Even at 70 your a hazard to higher speed traffic.

Most of the truckers drive 70, when they can.

Depends on where in CA. Big state. All I can speak for is I-5 or 99 in Central Valley but truckers tended to hover near the 55 towing limit and so did I. Truck flow made me less conspicuous towing but yes, it was a hazard with a line of trucks in right lane going 30 mph slower than flow of traffic. Created problem for someone not towing who wants to drive speed limit +/- 5 mph. Slow down to 55, bob and weave to stay the speed limit, or get run over. I don't miss it.

MarkTwain wrote:

Tom/Barb wrote:

Trackrig wrote:
Speed limits are usually 10mph less in CA when towing. Bill

Not quite, several highways in Ca the speed limit is 70 and some 80. towing anywhere is 55.

My max driving speed is 65, we loose a lot in fuel milage over that.

What hwy. in Ca. has an 80mph speed limit?? Never seen one!

Wondering the same thing! i lived in NorCal and SoCal for 60 years and i've never seen any highways with an 80mph speed limit.