2000Mile Winter Road Trip Recommendation

Surprisingly I can't find anything related to this on the forum so I am just create this new thread.
I am planing a road trip from Champaign, IL (140 mile South of Chicago) to LA, which will be 2000miles, right before Christmas. I have never done anything this long and I will be driving alone, I thought I could use some recommendations.
This is what I have found so far: please let me know if any of these are incorrect
- There are generally I-40 and I-70 route
- I-70 (Kansas City > Denver > LV >LA)is more scenery(not sure about winter) but steep and may have issue with snowstorm road closure in winter;
- I-40 (OK City > Albuquerque > Flagstaff > LA)is flatter and more boring.
- 500 miles per day is "ideal", 600 is "pushing it" 700 is "hardcore" and 800 is "brutal".
- I don't need to book a motel in advance, just stop where I have to stop and find a motel, this will allow me to possibly push a bit further everyday.

I will leave around Dec the 20th, and I want to be at LA as soon as possible.My current plan is to take I-40 and spend 3-1/2 days on the road, or 3 days if I can push a bit further everyday.
Day 1: Champaign > St Louis > OK City, 678 miles
Day 2: OK City > Amarillo > Albuquerque, 541 miles
Day 3: Albuquerque > Phoenix, AZ > Blythe, CA, 568 miles
Day 4: Blythe > Palm Springs (to visit a friend) > LA, 216 miles

Would this be a doable plan? What kind of issues I could encounter along the way(especially considering winter)? Would there be cell phone signals all along the way (you know, in case s**t hit the fan)?

Appreciate everyone's response in advance.

 

No. I actually just got new Assurance Fuel Max on all four. That was before planning this trip.

 

Oh Hey. Not yet but will buy the belt from the dealer tomorrow and try to do it myself.

OK, but honestly would this be necessary? This make me feel like my Prius is determined to break down on the road....
I do think this is a good idea though, just in case.

Yep, Stop and stretch in smaller interval I find helpful as well, I will definitely get tons of music and talk shows on the phone but maybe not books.

 

True dat! I will go in to the dealer to get the transmission fluid changed and I will let them show me the cracks if they still want me to change the belt.

The lumber seems like a good idea, can't find 2 dollar ones but 10 buck from Walmart is cheap enough. I will also be sure to load a bunch of audio books on my phone. Thank you for the suggestions!

I see. Maybe i-40 forth i-70 back could be a good idea to see the "full package" along the way. Do you remember if your 10-years-ago trip was during the winter or summer? I was just wondering if the view in any good in winter (being where you and I live I think you understand the legitimacy of the question).

 

Hey guys, I would like to report that I have safely made to LA.
the total distance traveled is 2192miles. I made a few detours other than just stop by the gas stations.
I did log the fuel consumption every time at the pump, and the MPG comes to be 45.13. Its not super impressive for some of you guys but I wasn't doing anything special other than normal driving. Besides, spending a total of 103 dollar and 13 cents on fuel to travel the distance that is more than the length of Japan will certainly drop a lot of jaws.XD

I end up driving 720/720/560 and 200 miles per day on the 4 day trip. Doing 700 miles is not as difficult as I thought it would be, I even had time to take a 30 min nap everyday, but I did travel after sunset (day length was 9 hour 10 min approx.)

The recommendation of the mesh lumbar support was very helpful, I can't drive without it now.
Again, Thanks for everyone's help in the forum.

 

OK trip report...
I got back from LA via i-15, i-70 then i-80 to Chicago, then drive south back to Champaign.

Learnt a few things on the way and have a few questions that Im sure the peps here can help me figure out (love you guys).
Things that I learnt:
1. that Arizona has mountains (I thought desert suppose to be flat)
2. that if you are doing a long downhill, and the HV battery is charged to 85％(I think, from torque app), the car will automatically act as in B mode(engine brake).
3. that conversely if you are doing a really long uphill (to Eisenhower Tunnel on I-70), The SOC indicator on the MFD can actually goes to 1 bar. And then the ICE really struggles. If I try to push the car harder at 45MPH in that situation the ICE start to choke (start shaking and lose power). This only happened once and there.
4.

Now questions that I have:
1. I got new Assurance Fuel Max tires about 150 miles before the trip, and I noticed the difference of the speedometer on dash and on my GPS. i.e. 73 on Dash and 71 on GPS. The reason I mention this is that I think this inaccuracy is messing with the odometer and MPG calculation. The planned trip from Champaign to LA was 2000 miles exactly, I end up traveling 2616 on the odometer, even taken into account the gas stop and distance to hotel that's too big a difference isn't it? this will seriously mess up the MPG calc as well since I don't know how much I actually travelled.
2. The other question is regarding oil change. The total trip was 5630 miles long, I didn't have the time to change the oil during the trip. even I got new oil in the engine at the beginning of the trip, it will still go sour before I got back. In my case I end up doing 2700 miles more than schedule in that old oil before I got back home and changed it. How much a influence of that will have on the engine? Should I follow the schedule dogmatically and stop on the road to change oil? I'm using the dino oil from Toyota BTW.
3. I have the Torque app set up on the trip to LA. I noticed that when I am coasting at 75MPH the ICE is revving around 2500RPM all the time. Isn't that a little high? Also in some part the trip I have to push noticeably harder to keep up to speed (75), such as the leg of i-40 in Texas, I m not sure its the weather, the slope(if there is any) or the car. For those of you who does a lot of road trip have you notice this before?

I made a GPS logger and tracked my trip, heres a what it looks like. Color shows elevation in meters.
Forth trip:

Back trip:


Hope some of you guys find something useful.


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Yes, road trip in the Prius is very comfortable. The road noise doesn't bother me at all, not sure it's the new tires or that I am so focused on the talkshow and audiobooks that I don't notice it anymore.
And thank you for the info on the oil. The word "sour" was used rhetorically but I didn't know about the rocket ejector thing. Hey you learn something new everyday !

Yeah I've changed the oil since I got back, and thank you for the remainder on the transaxle fluid, but I just changed it the day before the trip, I think I will hold on to this batch for another while.
Thanks