Alaska Airlines has a fare sale happening for tickets purchased by October 6, 2014. There are some low cost fares up and down the west coast like San Jose or San Francisco to Portland for $69 or to Seattle for $79.
Los Angeles to Seattle is $78.10 all-in one way on October 21.
The basic deal is flying from California to Portland and Seattle is less than $100 one-way from airports in California up and down the state from San Diego to San Francisco.
Combine Low Airfare with Cheap Car Rental to Phoenix or California
In May 2014 I made a one week road trip from Jacksonville, Florida to Norfolk, Virginia with a one-way National car rental on a seasonal special ‘Drive out of Florida’ discount rate of $15 per day for any size car, except SUVs. I drove over 1,000 miles in seven days with visits to St. Augustine Florida, Savannah Georgia, Charleston South Carolina and the Outer Banks of North Carolina.
A similar type deal is currently available for rental cars driving from Seattle and Portland airport hubs to Phoenix, Arizona or from Seattle to a place like Monterey, California.
One-Way Car Rental Rates Seattle Airport SEA to Phoenix Airport PHX Tuesday, October 21 to Tuesday, October 28, 2014.
Full Size Car (Expedia.com rates), unlimited mileage
- Budget $17/day ($91 total) mistake rate?
- Alamo $20/day ($228 total)
- Avis $20/day ($277 total)
- Enterprise $22/day ($246 total)
- National $24/day ($264 total)
Seattle to Phoenix is 1,400 miles one-way.
According to a recent survey cited in an article by Barb DeLollis this week, 51% of millennials don’t feel they have time for an extended road trip.
Road trip poll: 51% of millennials say they don’t have enough time for road trips – Travel Update
I have made two road trips to Seattle in the past six years driving from Monterey, California. I drove over 2,000 miles on each trip. I visited Lassen National Park, Crater Lake National Park and drove Cascade Lakes Scenic Byway around Bend, Oregon.
My 2008 trip was intended to route me along the Oregon coast, but a torrential November storm flooded the roads all along the coast during my two-week road trip.
This past year I have had a longing to drive the Oregon coast and revisit northern California’s redwood country where I lived in the 1990s.
Turns out I don’t even need to drive one-way all the way to Phoenix to get a good car rental rate out of Seattle.
Car rental rates are also low for one-way rentals out of Seattle SEA to Monterey, MRY.
October 21-28 Seattle-Monterey one way SEA-MRY is $202 all in for a Midsize car from Hertz.
$80 to fly San Jose to Seattle and $200 for a one week Hertz rental car to drive back to Monterey along the west coast. I have a feeling Best Western and Wyndham brand hotels are in my near future.
I watched the Cameron Crowe movie Elizabethtown again this week.
Kirsten Dunst plays Claire Colburn in the movie and she exclaims upon learning Orlando Bloom’s character Drew Baylor has never taken a cross country road trip.
Claire Colburn: To have never taken a solitary road trip across country? I mean everybody’s got to take a road trip, at least once in their lives. Just you and some music.
Elizabethtown – IMDB
The story ending is Drew’s road trip from Kentucky to Oregon with lots of music played in the car.
I feel a date with destiny is in my making with Alaska Airlines, Seattle, Hertz and a long solo drive along the coast beaches of Oregon to reach the redwood country of north coast California on my road trip journey back home.
Seattle, Washington to Monterey, California along the west coast is a 1,200 mile drive.
