Types of Road Trips + Travel Logistics

Loop

This type of trip has one anchor that is typically far from your home (let’s say a 6 hour drive or more, not typically a place where you would drive out and back in a day).  It differs from a line because the paths out and back differ.  The routes to and from the anchor destination are drawn to rapidly visit sites en route to and from the anchor destination.

One example of this type of road trip is one that we took earlier this year to Hot Springs National Park.  The road to Hot Springs, Arkansas took us two days of “quick tripping” where we traveled as follows:

• from our home in Central Ohio to Shiloh National Military Park and the home of Buford Pusser, the sheriff of McNary county that was depicted in the movie, Walking Tall
• then south to Brices Cross Roads National Battlefield Site, Natchez Trace Parkway, and Tupelo National Battlefield
• then west to Vicksburg, Mississippi where we visited Vicksburg National Military Park and the USS Cairo, Poverty Point in Louisiana, and the Arkansas Post before reaching our anchor destination in Hot Springs.

After arriving in Hot Springs, we stayed for several days exploring Hot Springs National Park and other nearby points of interest (see our post on Day Trips from Hot Springs and our list of 11 Things to do in Hot Springs National Park).

On our way back home, we visited Little Rock Central High School, and spent a day in Lexington, Kentucky so that we could wrap up our trip by watching the horses run on the last day at Keeneland.

Number of anchors: 1

Route: Different path out from the road back home

Time Required: 4+ days

Benefits:

• You get to set up a base of operation for more than one day in one place which can give you the opportunity to be a bit more rested and to become more familiar with your anchor destination.
• You get to experience more places and see more things by taking different routes.

Disadvantages:

• Can require a bit more planning, especially to efficiently visit the places that you are traveling to between your home and your anchor destination.
• This type of trip can require a decent amount of time off from work depending on how long you make your trip.
• Can be more expensive as you will incur more travel expenses due to longer distance traveled and lodging expense while on the road.

Triangle

This type of trip contains two points of interest away from home.  It is similar to a loop in that you do not take the same road out as you do back, but differs in that the purpose is to explore the points between the two anchors as opposed to adding stops to the routes out and back.

Our recent trip to Tennessee and the Carolinas is an example of this type of trip as we anchored our trip near Oak Ridge, TN and traveled the road from there to Asheville, NC, stopping at points of interest along the way.  After our exploring was done, we left Asheville to return home – no more stops.

Number of anchors: 2

Route: Different path out from the road back home

Time Required: 3+ days

Benefits:

• This type of trip can be completed relatively quickly with limited time away from work (depending on how you set it up).
• You get to experience several places that are at some distance from your home by making shorter duration stops in multiple places.

Disadvantages:

• Can require a bit more planning, especially to efficiently visit the places that you are traveling to between your home and your anchor destination.
• Can leave you exhausted as you travel a distance from your home and don’t set up a base of operation as the intent of the trip is to quickly move from place to place.

Star

The final road trip shape is a star.  The star shape emerges when traveling to a distant place and staying in one central location where you return each day after the adventuring is done.  One example of this type of trip for us was our trip to South Dakota (read our story here, or check out more details on the itinerary here).  On this trip, the roads out and back were largely optimized to get us to our Rapid City, SD destination as quickly as possible (we did take a detour to visit Clear Lake, Iowa though to visit the legendary Surf Ballroom and crash site of famous Buddy Holly, Big Bopper and Ritchie Vallens).  Based on our activity around Rapid City, the shape of the star emerges.

Number of anchors: 1 or more

Route: Can choose the same path or a different path out and back

Time Required: 7+ days

Benefits:

• You get to set up a base of operation for more than one day in one place which can give you the opportunity to be more familiar with your anchor destination.
• You get to experience several sites of interest.
• You have the opportunity to build in more time for rest and relaxation as you are returning to the same place night after night.
• You have more flexibility with your schedule because many points of interest are nearby. If you like a place and wish to return, you can do so as your sites of interest are not dependent upon you being in a particular place at a particular time.

Disadvantages:

• Can require that you prioritize the things that you really want to do. I tend to experience serious FOMO (fear of missing out) on these trips because I will see something that I would like to do but didn’t plan to do, and reshuffle the itinerary to accommodate it.
• This type of trip can require a decent amount of time off from work depending on how long you make your trip.
• Can be more expensive as you will incur more travel expenses due to longer distance traveled, food expense and lodging expense while on the road. We do employ a few good travel hacks for this type of trip though (like using hotel points and credit card points to reduce the costs of the stay, packing a cooler for the road, strategically selecting our base of operation to minimize food costs, etc).