When we did a driving trip among the Western national parks, we ended up doing hotels for the following reasons:
- Packing a tent, four sleeping bags, four sleeping pads, four pillows, and bath towels -- not to mention cooking equipment -- would've meant driving a bigger, less fuel-efficient car.
- Much of our trip revolved around the national parks and nature-oriented activities, but we also went to museums and historical /cultural locations across the west. Most of these weren't located near campgrounds, so camping would've meant more time on the road.
- Pitching a tent and rolling out sleeping bags is time consuming, and we didn't have unlimited time for our trip.
- Hotels often provide complementary breakfast, which is a pretty good value if you're talking about four people sharing the room -- and it makes for an easy morning, if breakfast is ready for you right there in the hotel.
- And our teens were more enthusiastic about staying in hotels. After long hours in the car and long hikes, they wanted to be able to stretch out on a comfortable bed in the air conditioning -- after taking a good, hot shower, of course.
We knew we were going to take this trip several years in advance -- we wanted our kids to be teens, old enough to endure hours of driving, not yet old enough to be tied up with summer jobs -- so my husband saved all his business trip hotel points, and that gave us a bunch of low-price hotels. We bid for most of the others through Priceline.