
There is lots more to do in this area too. There is also a jet boat trip on the Klamath River.įor places to stay look at also Mendocino (charming town, MacKerricher State Park for tidal pools, the botanical garden, Ride the Skunk Railroad through the redwoods, see the abalone divers at Van Damme State Park There is the harbor area at Fort Bragg. Check to see if the wild blackberries are ripe - they are so good when you pick them. There is the harbor area in Crescent City, the lighthouse, and inland Jedidiah Smith State Park.

Some of the things to see are Avenue of the Giants, Trinidad (a cute city by the ocean), Prarie Creek State park (elk), Klamath River and Requa Road (see the river flow into the Pacific Ocean), Trees Of Mystery, Crescent City. As if there isn't enough spectacular and breath-taking scenery along the way. Did I forget Morro Bay? The southern end of the Pacific Coast Highway, it is easily identified by its landmark Morro Rock, a 567-feet-high, turban-shaped, extinct volcano cone about 23 million years old.

What else? How about much photographed Bixby Bridge? It's a single span with a concrete arch more than 260 feet high and 700 feet long. What can we say about Big Sur? It extends 90 miles north of San Simeon, a coastline with redwood groves reaching skyward and the Santa Lucia Range plunging into the sea with waves pounding on jagged rocks. The Elephant Seal Rookery at San Piedras Beach, where more than 15,000 elephant seals migrant every year, offers one of the best roadside attractions you can imagine.
Coastal highway map the long dark full#
It's full of classical and Mediterranean Revival styles, antiques, paintings and sculpture and you have to see it to believe it's for real. Are you ready for San Simeon? Of course, you need reservations and a five-mile bus ride to reach the majestic and overwhelming 127-acre, 115-room Hearst Castle built by newspaper mogul William Randolph Hearst in 1919. Before leaving, treat yourself to breakfast and pastries at Renaud's Patisserie. You can't pass up dining in Santa Barbara. We received our culture fix by viewing the collection of European art at the Getty Center in Malibu.

A few years ago, we drove the Pacific Coast Highway north from Los Angeles. But that's only a speck of the scenic roadway. We even got a glimpse of migrating gray whales. Afterward, I visited the art colony of Carmel-by-the-Sea, Clint Eastwood's hometown, an upscale village of quaint and colorful cottages, restaurants, inns, shops and art galleries, and Point Lobos State Reserve, a 550-acre park of coves, headlands, meadows, tide pools, 250 species of birds and mammals and the nation's first undersea ecological reserve. Open golf championship at famed Pebble Beach. The first time I experienced the glorious Pacific Coast Highway, the storied ribbon of road that stretches 147 miles along the California coast from Monterey to Morro Bay, was in 1972 when I drove from San Francisco to Monterey to cover the U.S.
