Traveling cross country by car, need some advice...?

Question

I'm traveling in a rented economical car from southern california to kansas city, mo (thats about 23hrs) and i just have a couple questions since i've never driven more than 6 hrs at a time before. I will be driving alone, i wanted to know 1) whats the longest i can drive and not run down the engine? and 2) what if i wanted to drive the full 23 hrs straight, is that even possible or will the car (or my body) give out?

Answer 1

Firstly, it is possible to drive straight through, but likely it will take you more than 23 hours (even if it's 23 driving hours), since you would probably want to stop to eat, get things to drink and munch on, and go to the bathroom.  Not to mention feed your hungry car (which you will likely have to do about 3 or 4 times).

The first thing I would worry about, if you haven't driven more than 10 hours before, is did you get sleepy on your longest drive?  If you get tired *at all* - don't let it get to the "my eyelids are heavy" stage!  The $50 hotel room that you didn't buy isn't worth your life (and possibly the life of someone you might run into)!

Here are some good rules of thumb that work for most people:

1) Play upbeat music!  It makes it more fun and you're more likely to stay alert longer.

2) As mentioned before, fill up your car when you stop to fill up your tummy and/or unfill your bladder :)  Stopping for 15 minutes isn't going to kill your time in the grand scheme of things!

3) I discovered RockStar on a long car trip that I took fairly recently (Minnesota to San Francisco Bay Area - we drove straight through, but there were two of us).  We did an "experiment" with it and a few other energy drinks and found it to be the best/longest lasting.

4) Please, for the love of all things dear, stop when you are starting to get tired and find a nice cheap room in Colorado or wherever.  There's really nothing to prove here.  Plus, a nice 8 hours sleep could be the difference between a really fun trip and one that makes you loathe each state you had to drive through ;)

Answer 2

Well the car wont give out, but more importantly can you stay awake? Thats a long time beleive me. My mom has done it before when i was little like once or twice but Its such a long time I would be afraid of taking the risk. I would say if you are going to do it make sure you stop at a rest stop and get at least like an hour of sleep and then start up again every once in a while. Hope this helps and good luck!