Road Tripping across the US

Road trips aren't super conducive to saving money- there's expenses like gas, food, motel/hotel, etc.

However, I think we did pretty good.

Driving on the highway really helps our gas mileage, so we fill up a lot less often than when we're driving around town.

We only ate one meal a day in a restaurant while on the road. This was primarily due to our current dietary restrictions, but it also meant we didn't spend much on food. I did have to do a lot of planning: I made gluten free granola before we left and we brought little boxes of rice milk (cooled in a bucket of ice the nights we didn't have an in-room frig) to eat it with. I was able to search online ahead of time and find restaurants we could eat at for a late lunch/early dinner every day, and we ate snacks the rest of the time: fruit, veggies, rice crackers, peanut butter packets, nuts, etc.

I'm a bit cheap when it comes to staying in motels while traveling. They're not the destination, they're the stopover on the way to the destination. We're only there long enough to sleep, so I don't need a super-fancy (and expensive) hotel. Motel 6, reserved ahead of time, works for me.

We had a great time, and we spent less than we could have. Always a good thing!