I would have to say I70 going westward after the Rockies all the way to I15 is the most barren wide open interstate in the country, heck it even has a sign in Utah "No services for 110 miles" longest stretch of interstate with no services in the country, and believe me, there aren't. Also going up from Texas to Colorado, ain't much to be seen either, go thru a few small towns here and there, maybe see a few cars every now and again.
Like everyone else says, It's not very glamorous, and hoping to be a paid tourist is quite difficult, you can't always pull a rig into all the normal tourist destinations, and more often then not you will just be teasingly driving by them at the closest. I think I have only ever actually had the luck of picking up or delivering anything in the same area as a cool tourist attraction maybe twice, and both times no time to actually do anything. I did manage to go bobtail to the mall of america once, and by the way, don't ever do it
That place is NOT designed for large vehicles in any shape or form.
Wanted to go to the Grand Canyon, until I found out that all the roads that do actually go there are restricted, of course you could pay a fortune to either ride a train or other mass transit method out to it, more then I had at the time.
I got to spend a 34 hour reset in Vegas, there is a truck stop 2 blocks off the strip, but not worth it when I lost $500 my first night there...
I love driving, it fits me and my lifestyle very well, but I would say it is NOT for many, only a select few really are capable of it. You will spend a LOT of time sitting around waiting and doing nothing, and then when you do have a nice long load, all you will want to do is sleep when you are not driving.
As far as how long are you out there, all depends on your situation. If you work local, you may work 8-14 hours a day, but get home every day and have 2 days off on average a week, you will also usually be making frequent stops, have a lot more hassles of smaller roads more often then nice big highways, etc. Work regional you may get a weekend or something similar a week home, and go out for a few days at a time, again you will probably have frequent stops, but not like local, and you will at least get to travel highways more often then not. Or you could go the over the road all 48 type deal, and get home maybe every few weeks, often with the big companies you will be out for a month or more at a time, but usually your drive time will be almost all highway, but also a lot of your time will be wasted on waiting around. But again every driver has different circumstances, but those are generalizations.
Unless you eat mcdonalds and canned raviolis everyday, you will be in for quite a shock food wise as well. I've tried both major methods of life on the road eating, both keeping and cooking food myself in the truck, and just eating out for all my meals, usually I would always end up reverting back to just eating out (but always keeping food in the truck though), just because after 11 hours driving you don't really feel like sitting down and taking an hour or so out of your day to cook a nice meal, and or just sit there and eat junk food.
There is so much to what it is like out there, that I don't think it can really be explained fully, it is something you have to experience to fully understand, I know before I got into it I spent months researching it, which was good, I understood a lot of things I wouldn't of, and it really helped me to prepare for the lifestyle, but didn't really paint the picture like actually doing it did.
