USA or Canada coast to coast
 

I'm considering what to do next on my bucket list after a successful run to the top of Norway.
I'd like to go across North America on a coast to coast run, preferably on my own Triumph Explorer (I like it).

I'm aware there is better riding available by not going coast to coast, but it's what I'd like to do.

I'm currently looking at options for the route, I'd have around 2-3 weeks.

I work in the oil industry so things are not brilliant right now for work, I'd like to do this trip in 2017 but it may have to wait depending on how things pan out.

So, I have two routes in mind.
I don't really want to do the route 66 thing, I'm a fair skinned scottish person that catches fire in the sun so deserts are not my friends.

I'm thinking option 1 - Ship the bike to New York then ride to Detroit and up onto route 2.
Roughly follow that to Seattle and ship the bike home.

Option 2 - Ship the bike to Montreal, then use the trans Canada to get to Vancouver.

Both routes would allow me to take more interesting roads as much as possible, and both go through some spectacular scenery.

I take a lot of photographs and have a website (Leportphotographic.co.uk) so the scenery is a big part of what I like.

I'm not sure if camping would be a good idea on either route as hotels seem to be reasonably cheap and easy to get, I'm also scared of bears!

Any thoughts about the route or better ideas that sill allow me to see both oceans would be good.

How many miles/kilometers do you like to ride per day? What sort of riding (i.e., dirt, twisty two-lane, giant motorway, etc.)? And what specific kind of "spectacular scenery" (Mountains? Deserted muskeg? Flashy cities and crowded highways? River valleys and fertile waves of grain? Endless high plains vistas with dramatic clouds and mile-long freight trains? Waves breaking on remote lakefront cliffs and beaches?)? Etc.

The most scenery per mile (IMHO) would take you from New York by any of a number of routes up and over Lake Superior, then beelined to the Canadian Rockies, then winding through the mountains and river valleys to the coast north of Vancouver. However, there are many, many options.

Camping's cheaper and more varied. Cheap motels are more common in the States than in Canada. But if you're scared of bears, you can either choose to face your fears or stay indoors once you hit grizzly country--which in Canada tends to correlate with more expensive lodging options (c.f. Banff, Jasper, Whistler areas). Think about hostels, not motels, in Canada.

I'll also note that there is a big difference between two weeks and three. Two weeks allows no more than a couple of well-chosen inefficiencies to support your photography, but even a basic route would have you riding between 2500 miles/4000 km and 3500 miles/6000 km. You do the math.

Hope that's helpful.

Mark

The most scenic routes are close to the Rockies.

Since you don't have much time, i would leave from New York and ride quickly to Colorado/Utah using the mid-west freeways (about 3 days riding non stop) Then i would ride at a more casual pace enjoying the rockies going up north to Jasper / Banf. Then head to Vancouver.


Patrick

I usually aim for around 250 miles per day if the roads are fun twisties, I can do 400+ mile days if the aim is to get somewhere interesting.
I'll happily ride for around 8-10 hours a day including stops. I much prefer sweeping two lane roads to anything bigger but will use freeways to do the distance needed if it gets me more time int eh fun stuff.
Ideally I'd take three weeks and see a lot more but it's all very dependant on what happens with work this year.

On a trip around Norway this year I did 3700 miles in two weeks, there was around 100 miles of motorway on that journey. The rest was twisty.

Scenery wise, I've been to the Canadian rockies and loved the area around Banff and Jasper.
I'm happiest in open spaces with few people, lakes and mountains are great, deserted plains also good. I not big on cities or traffic if I can avoid it, I just tend to get lost a lot.

It's the many options I'm struggling with, most of the places I go there are a couple of routes and one will be better, not so much with this trip!
I was intending to stay in one country for the trip, is it easy to go between the US and Canada on a UK bike? I've done it in rental cars without issues.

I might have to man up and take the tent if it allows me more flexibility. But I've seen the Revenant....

We did NY to LA and back last year, going out (west) on a southern route in Sept and back east on a northern route in Oct. If deserts and heat don't sit well with you stay out of the south between March and October!

On the other hand we nearly froze to death up in the Rockies in mid Oct. It rained for days on end with temperatures hovering around freezing during the day and below that at night. That's not unusual if you spend most of your life in the UK but coming from 40+C in California the week before, the transition came hard.

My worry would be about your time schedule and the 3 weeks max you mention. Realistically you're going to lose a couple of days at either end sorting out shipping, paperwork, flights etc so you'll really only have two and a bit weeks on the road. Sea to shining sea is a long ride for just over two weeks. It's do-able but if you're serious about photography and 250 mile days the two ends are eventually not going to meet in the middle.

We're going back to the US this May for two weeks, again starting near NY but just doing a loop that goes out as far as the mid west before heading north to the Quebec area and back through New England. That two weeks is the time my wife has off work but it'll take me a week either side for bike prep etc.

Re hotels vs camping. I quite like the freedom that comes with camping and do it out of choice but if you're on a tight schedule the time it takes to set up / break down can really eat into the day - particularly if the weather is poor. There's loads of cheap chain hotels in the US at (roughly) double the cost of a campsite and most of them are quite liveable in for one night. We alternated a couple of nights under canvas with a night in a hotel to clean up etc and that worked well. By October though many of the northern commercial sites were closing for the winter and we found one where their definition of camping excluded tents. In touristy areas we struggled at times to find anywhere, campsite or hotel, that wasn't full. They'd go from being packed to shut almost overnight.

Hi there. A bloke called Richy did the same thing as you. He did Norway and he's just finished the states on his Honda VFR. Check out Wildbad Touring on you tube. or wildbad touring dot com.

Ah, I didn't know he'd gone across the states, I watched the Norway videos before I went and sent him a picture of the Hell sign with his sticker still on it!