I traveled across California in an RV stopped at 3 national parks and only spent $1,100

A group of three girls spent eight days traveling across California and kept their wallets happy.Bailey Dean, a travel and lifestyle content creator, documented her very envy-worthy camping trip with two of her friends.The three wanderlustful ladies proved you don’t have to spend a fortune to explore, as the entire trip cost less than $1,200 each.While the number may sound high, the road trip was eight full days and included three national parks, gas — which is still at an all-time high in California — food, campsites and renting a sleeper van.“Road trips are by far my favorite way to explore the US and can really be as cheap or expensive as you make them.

Dean said on a TikTok. “There’s just something about spending all day outside and waking up in a completely different landscape every morning.That’s always worth it,” she added.  Dean is right.

Road trips can be one of the cheapest ways to travel across the country, especially if you grab a few friends along the way to help split the cost.Data from Going.com — a travel service and app sending curated flight deals, mistake fares, and price drops — revealed that traveling shorter and more often can typically be “cheaper, more flexible, and more fulfilling.”For Dean and her two friends, that’s exactly what happened.The explorer broke down the cost of the entire trip, sharing how doable the road trip can be.This means that the final total came out to $1,134 per person for eight beautiful days in California.Notably, gas was the biggest expense.

“Gas was definitely the biggest pain of the trip California prices were around $7 a gallon.Thankfully our van wasn’t diesel because that could have been even worse,” Dean candidly said.The girls saved some cash by cooking what they say were “pretty elaborate meals.” While they definitely could have pinched a penny or two, they wanted to sip coffee every morning and munch on “way too many hiking snacks.” “We definitely could have d...