Anyone done a California road trip?

[Imonlysaying]

Morning! Just looking for tips really. What are the must-sees and best routes. It’s all a bit confusing! Thanks 🙏

What kind of trip are you hoping for? Nature? Culture? Something else? How long are you prepared to spend driving each day? Budget?

10/11 days. Budget around 5k (2 people). Not so bothered about cities, unless there’s anywhere we shouldn’t miss? Yosemite, Sonoma, Big Sur the places most interested in. 3/4 hours driving between places? Big holiday for us so don’t want to miss anything!

Eeek 10/11 days is a struggle, can you make it longer?!

I’d be flying into San Fran, and doing a loop including Yosemite, Tahoe and down the coast to Big Sur and up Highway 1 via Monterey back to San Fran for all the scenery. But I think that timeline is tight- you’re going to want 3/4 days in Yosemite alone if you want to get any hiking done!

Also, if you want to stay in the park, accomm will need to be booked like a year in advance as it’s very limited, if you’re happy to stay out, Mariposa is a good town with amenities but about a 50 min drive each morning.

Which month?

Drive down the coast from San Francisco. don’t miss Hearst Castle. Turn east before LA and you can visit Las Vegas and Death Valley and head back north through Yosemite. On the coast we liked Monterey and Santa Barbara.

I wouldn’t loop with 11 days - I’d fly into either LA or SF (we started in LA for various reasons, so I’ll describe that way) and did:

2 nights Santa Monica
2 nights Big Sur
1 night Monterey
3 nights Yosemite
3 nights San Francisco

Not so bothered about cities, unless there’s anywhere we shouldn’t miss? Yosemite, Sonoma, Big Sur the places most interested in.

Do you just want to go look at places from inside your car or did you want to get out of car to go swimming or on long walks and get into the landscape? Season when you go matters hugely, you wouldn't want to go to Joshua Tree in summer.

What does "shouldn't miss" mean to you, OP? How would you know you "shouldn't miss"?

11 days isn’t long, you won’t be able to loop. What are you thinking RV or car and motel / hotel?

We did this with a wine focus
Flew into LA one night at airport then picked up Mustang and then one night at each of the following which included between 2-3 hrs a day of driving. Remember the PCH is very very slow. 30 to 40 for most of it navigating bends and stop off points.

Santa Barbara (hotel by the pier for for the night)
Buelton (for a Sideways pilgrimage) which included Solvang, and Los Olivos (motel)
Paso Robles (our favourite stayed at a Native American style guest villa with vineyard)
Big Sur x2 nights (Treebones resort then a cabin in the forest)
Monterey (least favourite -tacky like Hearst Castle which we drove into and out again. I can’t even remember where we stayed)
Big Basin State Park (camping cabin)
San Fran (2 nights at a v expensive hotel)
So 10 nights for that

We then swapped the mustang for camper van
5 nights Sierra Nevada and Yosemite the. To to Mono Lake and up to Napa and Mendocino and back to SFO to fly back to LHR
Another 12 nights

I think you are being a little ambitious with your timeline! I would have hated to do LA to SFO any faster than 10 days. As it was we were missing out things and the driving is really intense and mentally draining. For me the joy of the PCH is the glorious scenery, empty beaches and wildlife and taking it all in, stopping regularly etc. Gunning it from one city to the next or only stopping at eg Monterey and Hearst would have left me disappointed

Agree with PP you need to choose the PCH end to end or do a Yosemite loop with 10 days. 20 days to do the full loop

Done it twice first time before kids, second time for dd1 18th bday.

first time
flew into LA 3 days there, glad I did wouldn’t do it again
Page loved it
vegas - i know you said no city but honestly embrace it for what it is I loved it and I’m much more of a middle of nowhere girl
death valley
yosemite do not miss, if you can afford to stay in site we stayed in curry village
monteray
San Francisco briefly

2nd time
San Francisco properly absolutely loved it great city want to go back to do the Alcatraz swim
monteray
yosemite
page including an overnight canoe trip on lake Powell brilliant
vegas flew home from there

main advice pick your must sees and spend a few days, you don’t want to be driving too much.

These were our stop offs:

Fly into Las Vegas, immediately drove to Death Valley
Yosemite
Pismo Beach
LA
San Diego
Grand Canyon
Las Vegas

The only one I wouldn’t do again was Pismo Beach. I don’t think their beach resorts are that nice.

If you're driving the PCH, then I find driving north to south better, as you are driving on the right, next to the coastline to view the sights.

We stayed at

San Francisco
Monterey
Pismo Beach
Los Angeles
Las Vegas
Death Valley
Yosemite
San Francisco

The PCH is lovely. I wasn't fussed about LA, but thought we would stop off for a few days seeing as we were heading that way, but I absolutely loved it. I also loved Death Valley. Yosemite was way too busy, but the sights are just stunning. We did this over a 4 week period, so you won't be able to do all of that, but it's a good route if you can extend your holiday.

Thank you all. We are looking at September. I agree our timetable is tight but we are stuck with it. It seems doing a loop is pushing it!
We would want at least 3 days in Yosemite.
Dont think anyone mentioned Lake Tahoe? Worth stopping there?

If you really only have such a short time you need to pick your bit of California and stick to it. I’d agree with doing a linear trip, but it depends on your must sees. Driving into LAX for an early evening flight home is horrible and I’d do a great deal to avoid that.

Really, if it’s nature and landscape you’re after (like me) you have lost of choices but can’t do everything. For example:

Flying to San Francisco, going to Yosemite, then maybe Kings and Sequoia; maybe Death Valley; maybe Joshua Tree (2 of 3 are do-able). If you do either of the latter, you could fly out of Las Vegas. There are a few amazing red rock areas near Las Vegas so it’s not all bright lights. The problem with going to Las Vegas is you’re perilously close to Arizona and the Grand Canyon so you might want to go there… Or you could just go north from San Francisco before Yosemite and see the spectacular coast and redwoods.

Flying into San Diego (or LAX, but see above), going to Joshua Tree and then picking up one or two of the national parks above, then seeing the coast between LA and SF, before flying out of San Francisco. Flying into (and out of) Palm Springs is an option too.

The choice of itinerary definitely depends on the time of year. The Sierra Nevada passes are closed mostly November-June for snow, but if you’re going in the summer heading North and mountains is a good choice as you will bake in the desert. If you do go to the desert in the summer, you can at least be up and out before 6am (jet lag) and do your hiking before it gets too hot.

Consider an America the Beautiful pass. For $80 a car-full can enter and park in all the national parks, monuments and national forests. And then you have to book a return trip within the next year because it would be wasteful not to…

Lake Tahoe is, I believe, very busy but beautiful. I think you could do a Yosemite, Tahoe, northern coast trip in and out of SF. Or you could fly out of Reno.

And booking this far in advance means you can stay in the Yosemite Valley itself. I’d do two nights, one full day - but 3 nights would be better of course!

September is a great time - all options on the table (but too much choice).

Also, National Park lodgings are usually cancellable so you can bag now and then get a refund if plans change.

We are looking at a similar trip next year. Just a heads up that the pacific coast highway is currently closed because of a landslide, around Big Sur, so you’ll need to bear navigating round that in mind when planning a route.

Highway 1 is currently closed at Big Sur. I’d give that a miss. We were there last week and we went from Monterey to Santa Barbara but had to go back to Monterey to get there - we knew but thought it was worth a visit but it wasn’t worth the huge detour.

We did
Vegas
Death Valley
mammoth lakes
yosemite
San Francisco
Monterey
Santa Barbara
LA (Santa Monica)

But it was almost 3 weeks.

We did last year it was amazing. My one piece of advice avoid Los Angeles it is a dump.
we did LA - Big Bear Lake - Vegas- Death Valley- Mammoth Mountain- Yosemite- Napa- San Francisco over 2 weeks.
we only had a day in Yosemite, you really need 2 or 3.
Apart from LA it was fantastic.

The one thing you must absolutely do in Yosemite, is stargazing. We were staying in a lodge in Yosemite, but drove away from any light pollution, laid down blankets and just........gazed.
The Milky Way was so clear, I felt I could reach out and touch it.

Magical.

Agree LA is VILE. We lived in Brixton at the time so not a stranger to gritty city life but that place was utter hell!

Yes I live on one of the worst cities in th UK so am used to all sorts on the streets but LA was a whole new level. I have never felt so unsafe anywhere in my life. We were supposed to stay there 2 days but left after 1. Even Hollywood boulevard is a complete shithole.

Lake Tahoe was stunning though I went 20 years ago ! We are looking at a trip next summer - avoid LA , flights to San Francisco or Las Vegas are cheaper .

I wasn’t expecting to like Vegas but it was fun and such a spectacle. We did a helicopter ride over the Grand Canyon from there which was incredible. 2 days there is plenty.

We did 3 weeks self drive. Flew to San Francisco for few days then picked up car route 1 down to La for few days then down to San diego. Then to Vegas and then yosemite. Then lake tahoe back to San fran to fly home. We were happy with the mix of sight seeing, big cities and also amazing days in nature in Tahoe and Yosemite