Why the United States
This is the country of gaps: between two states, the law, the climate, the price of a rent and health coverage have nothing in common. Travelling from one end to the other amounts to changing country without changing currency.
What people come for falls into two families. The cities — New York, Chicago, New Orleans, San Francisco — each with a sharply defined identity. And the national parks of the West, whose scale has no equivalent: the federal system counts sixty-three of them, and an annual pass covers entry to all.
Getting around
The train is not a serious option outside the north-east corridor. The Amtrak network is slow and expensive; flying and driving share everything else.
Car rental is the key to the West, and fuel there costs half the European price. In the city, parking is the real budget: in New York or San Francisco, a night in a garage often exceeds the price of the rental. The large cities have usable public transport; the others have none at all.
Money
Two rules decide the budget. The displayed price excludes tax: sales tax is added at the till and varies by state and sometimes by city, from zero to more than ten per cent.
And tipping is not optional. It forms part of staff wages: eighteen to twenty-two per cent in restaurants with table service, a dollar or two per drink at the bar, a few dollars a night for housekeeping. A meal advertised at thirty dollars therefore costs close to forty.
Before you go
Health insurance is the point not to neglect: an emergency room visit runs into thousands of dollars, and there is no safety net for a foreigner. It is the most important preparatory expense of the trip.
The busiest national parks — Yosemite, Arches, Zion, Rocky Mountain — now require an entry time-slot reservation in high season, to be taken weeks in advance. Turning up without one means turning back at the gate.
The laws vary from one state to another to a surprising degree: alcohol, cannabis, speed limits, carrying firearms and even the time change as you cross an internal border.