Math road trip

One of the many projects that we are finishing up right now is a math road trip. The goal of this project was to use a basic fill-in-the-blank style form to create a road trip and calculate all of the costs for it. We had to find out how many miles we went (yes, miles not kilometers) and calculate the total cost of gas, hotel reservations, food, vehicles, all the way down even to the luggage we took with us. We were given a theoretical budget of $10,000 and then were offered challenges that let us use more money. For my trip, I have $18,000 that I need to spend.

The first step of this project was to choose who to take with us. We were allowed to choose up to 7 people to take along with us. I chose to bring 3 friends because this way I could still fit everyone in the vehicle I wanted to take. I chose to bring Melika, my friend Morgan, and Mr. Snuffleupagus.

 

 

Next, we had to choose which meals to choose. We were given the option between luxury meals at $200 a day per person, Healthy nutritious meals at $100 a day per person, or fast food meals at $25 a day per person. I chose the healthy nutritious option because it was the most cost-effective while still being healthy. Next, we had to choose the lodging and accommodations. I could choose luxury suites for $500 a night, hotel rooms for $100 a night, or campgrounds for $25 a night. I chose to stay in hotel rooms because they seemed comfy, yet still affordable. For baggage, out of designer brand ($300), duffel bags ($75), or no bags ($0), I chose duffel bags for everyone other than Mr. Snuffleupagus, because he doesn’t wear clothes and therefore doesn’t need a bag to store them in. My total amount of food and lodging cost per day is $400, and the total amount of money I will spend on baggage for my trip will be $225. The equation I used to calculate the total amount of expenses was c=400d+225. C is the total cost, and D is the total number of days I will spend on my trip.

 

 

 

 

Next, it was time to choose my route. I decided to start and end in Central Park, New York. After departing, my first stop will be in North Carolina. I am planning to go to the North Carolina Sweet Potato Commission. Next, in Tennessee, I am going to the Duncan Christmas Tree Farm and Gift Shop. Here I am planning to help sponsor this farm for a year, which will cost me $250. I am also budgeting $300 to buy various Christmas-tree-related souvenirs from the gift shop. Next, we will travel to Oklahoma.

 

 

 We are going to a Verizon wireless store in Oklahoma City, and we are spending 3800 on new cell phones and accessories. After that, it’s time to travel to New Mexico. We are going to spend an afternoon at French Funerals and Cremations, and if we’re lucky we might even catch a glimpse of a funeral in-action.

 

After we are done, we are going all the way to the Grand Canyon. First, we will have a private helicopter tour, which will cost us a total of $1764. Next, we will take a 12 1/2 hour river raft tour for $1600. After we are finished with both of those activities, we will go to the Best Western Inn and Suites Grand Canyon. We will not be staying there overnight, but instead, we will take a 7-9 minute photo op break in front of the building. After we are done, we will head over to California to visit the Gentle Barn, which hosts free tours on the hour. Here I will sponsor a goat for a month. The goat I will sponsor is named Baron Von Goat, and it will cost $17. Next, we will drive all the way to Washington state to visit the Everett Imagine Children’s Museum, a very entertaining area that I used to visit quite often. This will probably take about 4 hours to go through everything. Afterwards, we will continue on over to Montana. We will be visiting Target, however, we will not be spending any time shopping. We will instead go to the Pizza Hut inside of the Target for a couple of hours. After that, we are

heading to Des Moines, Iowa. We will first go to Central Auto Repair and spend some time watching them fix various cars. Then, we’ll go to Petco to watch the fish swim around. I am allowing $3 to be spent on a new fish for Melika. After she’s chosen her fish, we will go to the Williams Cheese Factory Outlet and watch cheese being made. I will spend $66 on some of my favorite cheeses there. Last but not least, the stop I am most anticipating, is the New York Salt Museum. There is a free guided tour that shows the glory of the 19th-century salt industry. I am budgeting out the remaining $200 of my budget for various salt and salt-like items in the gift shop. Finally, we will make our way back to Central Park to end this trip.

Next, it’s time for some more numbers. The total length that I will be driving is 12,000 miles. It will take me 114 hours to drive this whole way. I had to calculate the least amount of days I could spend driving if I could only drive a maximum of 10 hours a day. This rounded to be 12 days. Next, I had to figure out how many hours I would have to spend driving each day of my trip was 31 days long. It amounted to ba 3.6 hours each day.

 

Now, onto the vehicles and related costs. I chose, out of 5 vehicles of various shapes and sizes, a Honda Prius. It will cost $34 a day. I chose this car because it was the cheapest vehicle that could still fit all four of us. This car got the best gas mileage, a whole 51 miles a gallon in the city or 48 miles on the highway. I found a route that avoided a majority of highways, so I calculated

using the city mileage. By diving the miles by the MPG, I found out that I need 235 gallons of gas for my trip. We were given a flat rate for gas costs of $2.80 a gallon, so 2.80×235= $658 on gas. The equation that I used to find the total vehicle cost per day is c=34d+658, with c representing the total cost and d representing the number of days we are traveling. Next, we put our equations into a grid to find how much our trip would cost in relation to the time we spend taking the trip. I chose a 21-day trip because my expenses factored in well with that. Then I had to make a graph to put this information into. This was a linear equation because it was consistently going up the same amount each time. 

Then I had the opportunity to use a sponsorship from different drink companies. Since I already had plenty of money, I decided not to use a sponsorship, but I still did the math to find out how much money I could have made. I had to find out the equation for each to see how much money I could earn each day. Next, I put it in a chart and graphed it to find the best deal for my trip, which was 21 days long. As you can see, Pepsi had the highest rate at $270 for 21 days, which is what I would have used had I needed more money.

This was one of the best projects that we have done so far this year, and was really fun to plan out as we went along. It made learning linear equations fun and straightforward.  Maybe next time we will go on this road trip for real!

 

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