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| Norman makes the PCH look pretty magical. At nearly a thousand bucks a day for this Canadian, it would have to be. |
Strange timing means I’ve got the week off after New Year’s Day this year. That means flying is a less expensive possibility, so what motorcycling trip might I do with that time? Norman Reedus did the PCH last year, that’d be nice. If my son and I were to go what would that cost?
1) Drive to Detroit would be a bit of gas, border & hotel money, pack only bike gear and a single change of clothes. Parking in Detroit would cost about $170 for the week including a night in a hotel (the flight leaves at 6am).
$250 for the first day and night (trip, hotel & parking). And that’s just to stay in Detroit!
2) Flights from Detroit to LAX are going for about $675. Throw in another $50 to eat bad airport food.
Land in LAX, cab over to EagleRider (10 miles) $30. EagleRider renting a BMW sport tourer for a week costs over $1400US ($1900 Canadian) if you want decent insurance coverage in the liability driven US.
Figure $300US a day in food, gas and hotels (travelling fairly minimally), and our eight days and nine nights on ground should run us about $2400US ($3250 Canadian).
The flight back is another $574 plus expenses…
Once back it’s another four hour slog over the bridge and back into Ontario through potentially lousy winter weather. Figure in an extra $100 for gas, tolls and eating to get home.
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| A thousand miles up and down the Pacific Coast Highway would be a nice way to end the holiday break, but at seven grand it’s a salty trip. |
I might have the time free, but this cheap-as-I’ll-go trip to California for just seven days (plus one in Detroit) would run to almost seven grand. It’s a nice bike, but the price difference between that and a smaller, less able bike to carry us and our stuff around isn’t that much (maybe thirty bucks a day less). This is assuming $100 a night-ish hotels, so nothing special and nothing near anything good. Other than the riding there isn’t much left to visit anything with either.
Renting a bike is expensive. Flying is expensive even if it isn’t a peak times and even if you drive to Detroit first. Hotels aren’t cheap, and the whole thing jumps up by 32% when I pay for it with the Canadian money I earn.
I guess I won’t be doing that the week after New Years.