I would definitely recommend going to San Antonio or Austin over Dallas.. especially if you have a limited amount of time in each place. Those cities have some cool things to see, and you could do either in a day. Also, sites are more "condensed" so you could do a lot without having to travel all over the place. And with San Antonio especially, you could do it all on foot.

I'll have to think of my list of things to do in Houston... Warning: it may be long :)

Beaches in Florida:Rosemary Beach or Seaside. They are in the Panhandle.Tallahassee is a true southern town, the state capital and right off I-10. If you go stop there, drive by the sorority houses at FSU. Beautiful, historic houses.

How about some important places from the civil rights era? This site gives some info: http://www.civilrightstravel.com.

I also wanted to mention that traveling any major highway in Texas warrants a stop at Buccess. That is an adventure all on it's own!

Thank you so much everyone for all your advice. We just got back and we had the best time!

We took the 30A, went to Dallas and San Antonio, sat on a beach at the Gulf coast, ate beignets at café du monde, saw Charleston, Savannah, Chattanooga, the Smokey Mountains, Hilton Head, Birmingham, St. Augustine, Jekyll Island, Little Rock.... the list goes on.

Great mix of scenery, food, culture, civil rights history, great people and amazing weather.

Cannot wait to go back someday.

Oh I hate that I somehow missed this thread the first time around. I definitely know quite a few of these places very well. Glad to hear that you had wonderful trip and definitely come back again some day!

Tell us more!
I'd love to hear about your adventure. Did you visit a college or two?

No official tours but we took a peek here and there. We planned on visiting Ole Miss but there were no tours available when we were in the area. We did take a peek on the University of Texas campus and drove past Clemson and Baylor. We would have loved a visit but couldn't arrange a tour there either. Most colleges only allow tours for prospective students, and since we're not, we couldn't book one.


We ended up driving from Miami, through the Everglades to friends in Tampa. Then took the 98 to the panhandle, the 30A, the 98 on to Mobile, the 90 through New Orleans, Houston and Katy to San Antonio. Then up to Austin and Dallas, where we saw the State Fair, up to Paris and Broken Bow (OK), the 70 to Little Rock, on to Grenada, Birmingham, Huntsville, Chattanooga, Knoxville and Gatlinburg, through the Smokey Mountains on to Greenville, down to Charleston, Hilton Head, Savannah, St. Augustine and Fort Lauderdale!
And all of that in 3 weeks.

We chose the smaller roads to be able to stop in the little towns, saw so much wildlife.. bears, elk, deer, armadillo, turkeys, alligators, turtles, flamingo... but fortunately no creepy crawlies or snakes :D

We loved the vast differences in culture, food, architecture and history. Especially visiting so many places in a row, the differences are vast. We were very lucky to just stumble upon great little Bar-B-Q joints, local bakeries and hole-in-the-wall restaurants.

Will have to go back quite soon, it truly was the trip of a lifetime!