We just got back from our whirlwind cross-country trip in our 1.9l westy "pickle". We drove 8000 miles crossing the country and back in 3 weeks (left the 6th, got back today, the 26th).

We averaged 21.5mpg and had no mechanical problems to speak of (I'll give a more detailed mileage breakdown in a later email.) The biggest problem we had is that the fridge didn't run on propane when driving (although it used to) and so we had to run it on DC while driving, which is a PITA. I'm going to email separately about this problem.

Main destinations on the trip were (started in New Jersey)

Mammoth Cave NP in Kentucky Cahokia Mounds outside of St Louis in Illinois Great Dunes NP in Colorado Mesa Verde NP in Colorado Arches NP in Utah Grand Canyon NP in Arizona Death Valley NP in CA Yosemite NP in CA Berkeley Yellowstone NP in WY Devil's Tower NM in WY Badlands NP in SD Chicago Pittsburgh

and ended back in NJ.

(we didn't spend the night at all of these, and in between some of these are stays at various state campgrounds.)

We saw a lot of great stuff and had a great time. Grand Canyon was probably the favorite. We woke up at 4am so that we could hike down it and back out, which was amazing. (If you do this, make sure you are really prepared. People die because they underestimate the situation. It would be safer and more fun to do this over multiple days, spending the night at the bottom, if you have the time and advanced reservations.)

Even though I had been out west of few times, neither of us had been to any of the national parks on the list, so this was really an amazing experience.

I could go on and on, but we just rolled in. Maybe I'll put up a website with some pictures at some point over the next week or so.

-Wes