Travel from Dodge to the Rockies?

[LAdodger]

I'm flying to Dodge for a couple months on Monday from LA. After that I want to travel back to LA via the Rockies...anyone have any tips on cheap travel? I won't have a car and renting one in dodge and dropping it off in another state is crazy expensive..at least a 100 a day.

I'm thinking of maybe taking Amtrak to La Junta, CO..renting a car and driving up to the rockies. then dropping it off in Denver and flying back to LA. I would prefer to take Amtrak all the way to Vegas and thn LA from there, but that would involve way too much bus riding time from what I've seen.

[Made in the USA]

Amtrak goes right through the Rockies and right in to LA!

[LAdodger]

not really..from dodge it barely touches CO..only in La Junta and then goes south towards LA.

the other option is picking up a separate route in northern colorado..say in mccook, NE and then take that all the way west to san fran, and then rent a car and drive south to LA

I think I'm going to take the one into la junta..rent a car and drive north, do some camping, and then pick up the other train to san fran and drive the coast

[Zeb]

Here is a REAL scenic route we took to cripple creek. Just west of Canon City there is a road called Phantom Canyon Drive (I Believe). We were in no hurry and it was a good thing. The road started out paved for a few miles then turned to dirt the rest of the 25 miles to Cripple Creek. We stopped and took pictures of a bunch of wild horses running thru a beautiful canyon. After the road turned to dirt and we got higher up in the mountains, it got tricky. The road at points was just for a single vehicle. We met a few times big RV's traveling the trail and had to back up and get over as far as we could to let them pass by us. The road followed a creek and there were people camping all up and down the road/trail. We stopped and spent the night along the creek, it was fun. However it took us 2 hours to travel 20 miles on this road. We were ready for Cripple Creek the next day.

[jackknife]

Couldn't you pick up the train again and just go straight to LA from La Junta? It goes right to Union Station downtown. Unless you are wanting to do the San Fran to LA drive and stop along the way at Big Sur and stuff.