Are we Nuts? Travel cross country in 7 days?

Why would you do that to such small children It will not be fun or educational for them.

You can do it, but it's such a waste. It will be like an 8 hour plane trip every single day. 8 hours in a tin can, and very little time outside of it. It will be hard on the kids and they will fight. Plus, you don't like bad smells and you want 4 people in that tin can for a week?

I think you would be much wiser to limit the driving to something like 3-4 hours every 3 days. For a 6-day trip, pick one destination, 3 hours away, go there, stay two nights, go to one more place, then home. Obviously, that would not coincide with hubby's work trip, but it could be a different time.

Sorry, I would never do the trip you have planned. You have too many issues to begin with - smells, cleanliness, noise.

You are considering a 25' which is small for that long and fast of a trip. Also, I assume it would be in the coming months and you are going to have triple digit temperatures in Arizona.

Also, since your husband has to be there on a certain day, what if you have repair problems or medical problems enroute. You don't have the extra time to deal with it. Also, are you willing to help drive? That's a long way for one driver in a short time.

By all means rent and go someplace closer to your home. You will all enjoy it much more.

That is certainly a reasonable amount of time for the one way trip if you believe there is nothing to take your time to stop and see. When was a child we made many trips at an even faster pace, kept track of what we found so we might visit those places on a later trip. moved about as fast through our working lives, it was not until retirement that we could slow down and visit more of the places we discovered on our on road trips, e.g. Michigan to Central Florida as six days instead of two (or one very long drive). but always, even in those 50s and 60s cross country road trips, we took time to stop and visit one or two interesting places each travel day. It was easier then, because there were no Interstates, everything was advertised right alongside the road, and we were moving most of the time at 45-50 mph rather than the 70-80 people move today.

I suggest your trip be planned as a loop, coming back a different way than you go, particularly since one of your interests (Grand Canyon) is on the I-40 route following old Route 66 which is wealthy in natural, historical and tourist attractions, and the other (San Antonio) is on I-10 which has long "empty" stretches if you don't know what attractions to seek.

If you can work it into your route, I suggest a visit to the meteor crater site east of the Grand Canyon. As an earth feature, this is really more important to the interaction between man and Earth than a canyon that took millions of years to carve.

Renting a RV for the trip is a good idea, since you are not sure you'll like that mode of travel. It is not really camping, unless you want to make it camping, as you take a house with you. But you may not find that house as comfortable as your own home, and only by trying it at least once will you know whether or not it is comfortable enough. That's a lot better than buying one to find out that you don't like the lifestyle; I got my RV at a good price from a family that bought, made one trip, and decided they just couldn't live that way. You just won't know until until you try.

7 days there and 7 days back. Not 7 days round trip. JMHO

In my opinion, it would be way too aggressive for 6 days especially with small children. Google maps says it's 36 hours driving time at the posted speed limit which you won't be able to do in an RV. You also have to factor in rest stops for the driver and fuel stops, possible road construction and traffic or accident delays. You would be driving or sleeping most of the time and won't really be able to enjoy the trip. Driving an RV is more stressful than driving a car. You will also need another stop between San Antonio and the Grand Canyon because it's 16 hours of driving. Also if this trip is in the summer the temperatures will be very hot out west. I think you're right about renting an RV and taking a trip closer to home before you head out west. If you had more time (10 days to 2 weeks) it might be doable.