Driving beer cross country this weekend. Please help

Hey all, I’m driving my wine collection of about 3 and half cases from New York to Las Vegas this weekend. All of my bottles are on the high end (scarecrow, SQN, Bevan, Harlan, etc) so I need to try to get this done as smooth as possible. I originally was looking into wine transport companies and stopped after the first two wanted between 3k-3500 for it. My plan is to only drive when the sun is down until the sun comes back up. The temps across my trip during those hours Will be between 45 and 65F. I will be in hotels and out of the sun all other hours to rest. I plan on keeping the beers in styrofoam 12pk boxes within cardboard in the back of my suv. I will have plenty of non condensation ice packs and insulated blankets as well. Has anyone attempted this before or can anyone throw some useful tips my way? Anything will be appreciated. I know that I could’ve waited until the winter and either flew it out here or shipped, but I don’t I don’t want to have the burden of having my family monitor and check on my eurocave daily for the next few months. Thanks everyone

Should not be an issue in that weather and in styrofoam boxes. Personally I’d just put them in lie flat boxes so they take up less space and put it inside the car with you while you drive so you worry even less. Then move the 3.5 cases with you into the hotel.

Awesome I really appreciate it.

3,000 dollars to ship 42 bottles of wine?

Damn.

You can’t Fed Ex them?

If you are truly compelled to transport them, that’s hardly any space you are taking up. Keep them in the temperature controlled part of the vehicle with you and they will remain at the same temperature as you for the entire trip…day or night…and drive whenever you like! Take them into the hotel when you stop, but time of day should not matter.

I brought my digital thermometer with me all day yesterday in my car and temp inside car hit 71 and humidity of 35%. That’s why I am worried about driving during the day. If I’m wrong that would be amazing if it won’t be in issue being stored in unline styrofoam shippers and covered in an insulated blanket

The wine will be fine.

Agreed. No issue at all

71/35 is no big deal for a few days. Even a few weeks. Those big Syrah and cabs can handle it.

I’m running with the crowd on this.

I think you will be happy no matter how you prefer to drive.

(I agree about the joy of doing it at night. It’s relaxing.)

We poorly planned our move from Las Vegas to Chico (about 650 miles) and hit a time crunch based on the house selling. So, June, U-Haul…many cases of wine. Put down insulating pads on the truck floor, then pallets, in the pallet gaps we put every blue ice brick in our hoarded collection, then the wine stacked in U-line cases, then blankets, then we jammed our foam bean bag chairs (a dozen of them) on all sides of the wine cases. We took the wine to 53 degrees prior to the move. Left at dusk, arrived by dawn, into the new cellar…at 54 degrees! The wine only gained one degree during the move.

Your idea of insulated blankets is prefect. Add some cool packs, re-freeze the cool packs while in the hotel, and you will win!

Oh, and best wishes!

I have an audiophile wino buddy in Las Vegas if you need to meet a friendly person.

Awesome thanks to all. Much needed stress relief hearing this all

What they said above. Keep them in the car. You’re over thinking it big time. Do you think Fed Ex puts them in refrigerated trucks, or the various importers and distributors? If you got wine from CA that you’re taking from the East Coast to Las Vegas, they’ve all made the trip one way already and trust me, those truckers did not stop during the day and keep their trucks out of the sun.

And if the wine is in styro, it won’t reach that temp if you crack all the windows at night and let the car cool down. Just keep the AC cranked while you’re driving, and always park in the shade when you stop for more than 10 minutes.

Why does the beer into this (as in your subject line)?

Yeah, for sure prioritize the expensive stuff and put in the car with you. Take inside the hotel at night and live regular hours. EZ PZ really. Done this many, many times. Not sure where beer comes into all this but overnight in the car I would not worry if. In fact if cool when you park for the day can prob even stay in the car.

I’d try to stay in ground floor rooms to keep things simple here. Drive up is easiest but not usually the nicest places.

I drove from Paso to Seattle with 4 cases of wine when the ambient temps were 108, I just bought half a dozen bags of gas station ice and put them inside plastic lawn bags to prevent leakage, stashing them all around the wine. The wine was cellar temp the whole way home, easy peasy.

Good luck. Keep an eye out for this guy. He’s got a thing for beer smugglers.

You can think about it…just don’t do it.

Make sure you don’t have the heater on in your vehicle and/or be careful about where you have the wine. Trying to pack things for a family trip economically, I once put some magnums under the backseat of the minivan on a trip from VA to Cleveland in the winter and didn’t realize there was a vent there. Somewhere in Pennsylvania my kids said: “It smells like wine back here”. The heat had forced the cork and half of the wine out of one of the bottles.

Thank You! I was going to suggest call Bandit Darvil…

it does make you wonder, doesn’t it?