Help a poor college student plan an awesome spring break

New York and SF Bay are expensive.

Are you flying or driving? What's your budget (beyond "unemployed/undergrad")? Do you want warm or cold? If you end up going to New Orleans, check out http://. You'll end up feeling really guilty if you go there just to sightsee/enjoy the nightlife.

SXSW in Austin usually coincides with spring break. if you can find a place to stay (they're all booked, but ask around for couches or rent an RV), you can go to free day shows during the day and drink free beer and eat free bbq, take a nap and go to free afterparties at night, drink free beer and eat free tacos

You're in Rolla? Trips to the east or west coast are going to devour your week, unless you're considering flying, in which case you're not dealing with any undergrad budget I'm familiar with. For my first spring break, we went to the Smoky Mountain National Park. It can be cold, and there was snow for half the week, but it was a lot of fun (and it was warmer and greener than where we were coming from, so...). There were a lot more spring breakers there than I would have thought, too. And it was cheap. If something like that doesn't interest you, I'd drop the number of participants and do a Route 66 road trip, go BBQ tasting in Memphis/take a blues tour up and down the Mississippi. Something where the drive is kinda the point. Good work stepping up to plan.

What exactly is the unemployed/underemployed undergrad's budget? A number will make it easier to give you advice. Just a word of caution after seeing this No one seems to want to commit to anything beyond "not where my parents are," so I guess I'm going to try and get the annoying planning part done.: Make very sure that all of these people commit (i.e. buying tickets/putting down money in some other way they won't be able to ask you for back later) before you spend a lot of your own $$$. http://ask.metafilter.com/138435/Cheap-Couple-in-NYC is a prior thread on cheap lodging in NYC.

When I was in college we rented a beach house from vrbo.com and drove to the gulf coast (Pensacola, FL was what we picked, but there are lots of good options). It was a reasonable drive from Wisconsin, so it will be an even shorter drive for you. We had an awesome time and it cost less than $400 per person. ALSO, on a trip like this, you'll be dealing with lots of shared/split costs; Things like gas, groceries, meals on the road. If you aren't careful about splitting things, someone can end up spending a lot more than someone else. We all threw in $200 at the beginning of the trip and bought two prepaid Visa cards from the bank. We used these for all the shared costs. It was awesome and eliminated all the hassle of settling up at the gas pump or the grocery store. I suggest looking into this if you end up doing a road trip type adventure.

Just a word of caution after seeing this No one seems to want to commit to anything beyond "not where my parents are," so I guess I'm going to try and get the annoying planning part done.: Make very sure that all of these people commit (i.e. buying tickets/putting down money in some other way they won't be able to ask you for back later) before you spend a lot of your own $$$. Yeah, I tried to organize something similar to this (road trip to Memphis, actually--mostly because, for reasons I cannot explain, there was some part of me that wanted to see Graceland) and people were really, really psyched in the planning stage, but much less psyched when it came to, you know, actually forking up cash and going. On the other hand, we went on several extremely cheap camping trips during college which were easily planned and everyone was perfectly motivated. Would highly recommend camping as a great spring break alternative.

Spring Break, 1967... Phil owed a van (and, back in 1967, very few people owned a van, they were relegated to flower delivery and other commercial purposes). We were all attending Jackson Community College (Michigan)... and, three of us decided that we needed to break the bonds of boring midwest existence... Phil, Doug, and I put a bed in the back of the van, bought ten cases of beer, shoved them under the bed, and headed south. Within 30 miles of leaving Jackson, Phil ran a red light (accidentally, wtf was he thinking, we had ten cases of beer in the van!!??) and all of a sudden there was a red light flashing behind the van. Phil had about 10 points on his license and couldn't afford another ticket... Doug was in the shotgun seat and, at 50 miles and hour they changed seats (curtains on the van in all the windows in the back). In the process the van veered off the road on the left, veered back, and Doug pulled over. A ticket was issued...Doug took the bullet... but, not having a valid insurance certificate, we had to go back, pick one up, and show up at the justice of the peace's office.... Nope, nobody noticed the ten cases of beer under the bed... Two hours later we were headed south again, driving in shifts, straight through to Fort Lauderdale... (no interstates, kids... these were shitty two lanes through the mountains!). The only event of note between Jackson and Lauderdale was a stop at the Green Frog Resturant in Valdosta, Georgia for breakfast. Phil, always the lady's man, was hitting on the waitress with the southern accent... When the food arrived, Phil noticed a bug in his eggs.. "Miss", he said..."there's a fly in my eggs.." (just another excuse to hit on the georgia peach)... She came over, took a look, and said "Nope, it doesn't have any wings, it can't be a fly.", and walked away.... Doug and I were still laughing when we hit the Florida state line. We found a cheap motel, three high school girls from Lauderdale, and spent the next five days making out, drinking beer, and laying on the beach... Bottom line... it didn't matter where we went... all that mattered is that we were with people we liked, found someplace "away" from the home port, and managed to avoid being arrested. And every single event was fun, and we laughed, and, 43 years later... we all still remember that trip. Only go with people you really like, have fun....don't be too stupid...

FUckin' a, man, do what I did sophomore year in college. Guy I knew from *one* class, and some other dude, went out to the Grand Canyon. First road trip I ever took. Chillier than I expected. Sooooo goddamn worth it. By March, AZ and southern UT are get-a-cabin cold at night, but pretty sweet during the day. Death Valley is also a candidate - by May, it's fuckin' miserable during the day. Logistics: anything that is community - gas, park passes, tolls - come out of the envelope that everyone puts a couple hundred in at the start of the trip. Everything else, you buy yourself.