Introduction
Having been on a road trip to the state of Pennsylvania, here are my most useful tips to know before driving in the U.S. in general. If you are already an experienced Canadian driver, driving in the U.S. will feel quite frankly, similar. Nonetheless, try to remember the following tips if it will be your first time.
Plan Your Arrival And Departure Times Carefully
Our car trip was expected to last 8 hours, but it took us 9 and a half hours instead, because of occasional traffic, fuel and bathroom stops and not to forget, border controls. Therefore, try to factor in all of those when planning a road trip especially if you need to be somewhere by a certain time. As a rule of thumb, IF POSSIBLE, give yourself a margin of at least one hour. If you know in advance there will be heavy traffic, give yourself as much time as you can.
Watch out for weather alerts like tornadoes or snowstorms.
How To Survive Border Controls 👮♂️
BEFORE you stop at any border control, have your passport right next to you and ready to hand out. The three most important questions you need to prepare for are the following:
Where are you going and what is (or was, when returning to Canada) the purpose of your trip?
How long are you planning to stay (or how long did you stay in the US? , when returning to Canada)?
The more confusing or vague you sound when answering the previous, the more they will press you for information.
Therefore, know how to answer them in advance naturally, simply and quickly! The remaining typical questions are just to verify your identity from your passport such as where you live, if you own the car, how old you are, your date and place of birth, etc. They have to ask them to make sure you are not stealing anyone else’s identity nor inventing one to illegally cross the border. Look up their website to make sure you are not bringing anything illegal and don’t lie on anything.
What’s The Driving Experience Like? 🛣️
Generally speaking, if you own an official driver’s license from Canada, you can legally drive in the U.S. (it’s always a good practice to check with your local regulations though). Be careful with the speed limits, because they are labelled in miles per hour as opposed to kilometers per hour. Also, on highways, they are 10 km/h higher than the limit on Canadian ones so that really surprised me a little and driving felt a little quicker than usual. Trucks and slower cars must stay on the far right lane at all time to avoid slowing down everyone else. Also, when refueling, gasoline will be weighed in gallons instead of in liters so don’t worry if the number appears much smaller than you are used to, because one gallon represents around 4 liters.
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