Recently, more and more friends around me choose go on road trip when traveling abroad. Sister Tiankai made a trip on the road in the United States before, and summed up some practical tips to facilitate everyone to plan their trip in advance and prepare for it.
Rent a car
You can book a car at home, rent it from the airport and return it from other places. You can also rent a car anywhere after you get off the plane.
generally speaking, international chains are more expensive, such as Hertz. Renting a car in official website will be more expensive. My sister's neighbor rented Hertz's car on priceline and paid more than ten yuan. In official website, it costs at least fifty or sixty dollars a day.
car rental insurance: you can choose the default basic insurance, or you can add some yourself. It won't be too expensive, such as insurance for car crash and damage to the contents of the car.
Stay
If you want to relax in road trip, you don't have to book a room in advance. You can make a reservation while walking. If you have a reservation, you can find a hotel and stay. You can find vacant rooms in tourist areas and small towns. Of course, the price may not be as good as booking in advance, but it is more flexible and free. You don't have to arrive at the hotel booked in advance on time. You can stay there as long as you want.
I stayed at a literary motel in San Francisco, where I had kitchen utensils, tableware, spices and cooked a delicious meal.
summary
bottled water, go to a bigger supermarket, 24 bottles for 2 or 3 yuan. Otherwise, a bottle of wine on the way will cost 1 or 2 dollars.
China people's favorite things, such as instant noodles, sausages and pickled mustard tuber, can be bought in supermarkets in China. Instant noodles are rarely served in cups, which is more troublesome, so booking a hotel can be apartment-style and can cook. After eating hot dog hamburgers for a few days, cooking instant noodles will be extremely happy. There are more Chinese supermarkets in Los Angeles, 99 Dahua Supermarket. If you go to China, you can buy some bread cakes, because the bread cakes that Americans eat are oily and too sweet. Los Angeles is still 85, and business is good.
charging treasure (mobile power supply), car charger, navigator or navigation app.
don't transfer the plug, use the domestic two-pin plug.
Familiar with traffic rules
Sister Tiankai did this: rented a car, drove around the accommodation with few cars, got familiar with road conditions and traffic signs, and got on the expressway.
Common traffic signs:
Turn around: Don't turn around.
one-way: one-way street
stop: stop and wait for 6 seconds, but usually look around and no one can leave. If there is no signal light at the intersection, there are cars in all four directions. The basic practice is to pass by one car in one direction and take turns, so that it will not be "dead". I think if a traffic light is broken in Beijing, the intersection scene is too "beautiful" to look straight.
Carpooling only: Carpooling lane, that is, cars with more than two people, including drivers, can take this lane, which is the innermost lane on the expressway and is very useful in traffic jams.
the direction of American highways is very clear. If you don't go, the road sign will be gone. It won't be a problem to follow the navigation. Don't change lanes frequently on the expressway, so everyone will walk faster. The highway conditions in the United States are average, not flat in China. After all, it has been many years, but there are many lanes and they are free! The speed is very fast. Although the navigation always reminds you that it is speeding, there will be no problem if you follow the traffic flow. On the contrary, if you are too slow, you will be fined for "obstructing traffic", usually driving at a speed of 1-12 km/h.
the sign is 2 or 3 kilometers ahead of schedule. Change lanes as soon as possible and be sure to turn on the lights. Otherwise, everyone will go straight by default and no one will hold you back. Moreover, many exits stipulate which road can only take which lane, so change lanes as soon as possible.
The red roadside is a fire lane. No parking, remember!
pay the self-service parking fee. Some are coin-operated, some are credit card-operated, some automatically calculate the parking time, and some buy the parking time in advance, so you can stop after coin-operated
Apple or Android phones are enough. Sister Tiankai rented a car for more than a month, and she relied on Google Maps to go anywhere. However, when it is different from the powerful map of China Gaode, you can't query the destination through poi points of interest (such as buildings). You must enter the house number, so you should check the house number in advance.
Booking (Bink)
You can use the booking.com website first. Almost all foreign hotels can be booked, which is both evaluative and objective. When you are in road trip, it is more convenient to download the application to your mobile phone.
download the number of routes to cities and scenic spots in advance.
Introduction to Highway 1
If you take Highway 1, it will be enough. Apple's app store can be downloaded, showing navigation functions in addition to scenic spots.
Let's talk about the only scenic spot on Highway 1: Walrus Beach (sea lions, seals, walruses, silly and confused)
Walrus is very big, weighing several tons visually, but it looks like pools of dead fish when it is far away ~ ~
There is no fence here, only a small warning sign telling people not to touch it. No one manages it, no one collects money and of course no one sells water. Both adults and children stood on the shore and watched.
Death Valley, the barren land along Highway No.1
Shout
"Public Comments" in the United States can display the comments of surrounding restaurants, look at the map and bring up Google Maps navigation.
Sister Tiankai of this app thinks the most useful thing is:
Look at the picture and order! Because foreign menus are all words without pictures, and many new words are unknown at all, they may not be found in dictionaries. Sometimes, if we want to see what others eat, we have to eat the same.
But there are many comments on yelp, and with pictures of dishes, you can point to the pictures and tell the waiter what to order.
these apps are recommended to be used in China first to get familiar with their functions. Besides yelp, there is also a Chinese version.
[ Important Tip ]
How to cheer for yourself?
as you know, American gas stations don't have gas service personnel, so they have to come down and insert oil guns themselves. You can pay by credit card, but the only time Sister Tiankai tried to pay by credit card completely helped herself, and it didn't work.
I wonder if it's because domestic credit cards can't be swiped. In some places, it is quite troublesome to enter the postal code, so the most convenient way is to go to the small shop at the gas station and tell the clerk how much oil I want to add and what number the oil gun is. He will give you an oil gun, and you can refuel.
if you don't know how much to add, you can give us $1. After adding it, a receipt will come out, or you can just remember the amount and tell the clerk that the clerk will give you change. We drove by car on Highway 1, and we haven't met a gas station or a shop that can only pay by coin, so it went smoothly.
how to use navigation?
as I said before, you must look for it according to the house number. You can query poi in the United States. The navigation name is tomtom. Look at the app store. It's RMB 273! Local tyrants don't mind playing.
Car rental companies have Chinese navigators to rent, which seems to vary from a few dollars a day, usually garmin's. Sister Tiankai uses both the navigator and Google Maps. She thinks Google Maps is very detailed, accurate and complete.
how to bring us dollars?
cash families with less than 1, yuan and individuals with less than 5, dollars should declare more. It is no trouble to declare.
If you are afraid of insecurity, you can bring a domestic credit card and a stored-value card with the UnionPay logo. Most merchants can swipe credit cards, and stored-value cards can take cash. Generally, they can only take 3 yuan at a time, and each card has a handling fee of several dollars.
traveler's checks (paper/electronic) are not very reliable. My sister brought an electronic traveler's check with her. It's a stored-value card, and there are dollars in it. Traveler's checks are all issued by American Express. Ae charges are high, and many small shops and restaurants don't accept it. Many ATMs don't offer cash withdrawal service. The only advantage is that domestic relatives and friends can deposit money in it at any time, and if there is any balance, they can withdraw it or swipe it in the United States. Moreover, they can report the loss and activate another spare card immediately. It is more suitable for international students, and the remittance fee is one thousandth.
how to save money?
Many American price comparison websites, such as China's Qunar, such as priceline. Rent a car with neighbor priceline, which costs more than ten yuan in Hertz and 6 yuan a day. There are also car rental agencies recommended by travelers. For example, c
commonly used price comparison websites include expedia.com (Intelligent Travel World) and agoda.com(Accorda). Both have Chinese interfaces. Sister Tiankai has used agoda, has a Chinese interface and accepts credit cards from China. Sanya four-star hotel has rooms with windows on three sides, 16 for three nights and more than 3 for one night in peak season.
There is also a magical and expensive travel website (the membership fee is relatively expensive), which is suitable for booking very cheap hotel air tickets long in advance. If the price is reduced after booking, the difference will be refunded by 1 or even 1.5 times. It's called worldventures.biz, and you need to register in the member recommendation system. If necessary, you can ask me once-friend, because you have to provide some sensitive information.
The largest group buying website in the United States is called groupon.com, and its usage is the same as that of China.
how to change the mobile phone card?
you can buy a mobile phone card when looking for att, verizon and other local operators or small shops, because navigating with Google Maps on your mobile phone requires a lot of traffic. Most mobile phone cards in the United States have unlimited traffic, generally about $5 a month, and some also include 1 minutes of international calls.
if you roam with a domestic mobile phone, the traffic is very expensive.
However, the United States is a vast land with few people. Maybe there is no signal on your mobile phone and navigator. When you drive on the deserted Gobi desert with an empty stomach, it's getting late and there is no signal on your mobile phone or navigator. After driving for 1 kilometers, there is no gas station.
I'm really scared! I can't help but think of the movie No Man's Land. How to avoid it? Don't go.
The San Francisco Bay Area was shot on the Golden Gate Bridge
Hoover Dam and Autobots.