Big Sur Travel Forum

We're visiting Big Sur in early June. We'll be arriving in California(driving) from Reno. I really wanted to travel up the coast from Big Sur (south to north) but upon studying the map it appears that it's going to be more practical to start from the north and travel south. Any thoughts on this?

Depends on how you get from Reno to CA. you can take 395 south then cross over some place in the mid state and come back north on HWY 1 to Big Sur...Might take a few hours longer (day or two) but it is very scenic.

The other option is Hwy 80 reno to SF. 101 south to Monterey, then 1 south to Big Sur. Still a slow trip but again very scenic. Just remember, there's not much there but scenery so time your trip accordingly.

Thank you for the reply. We may just drive down from SF instead of doing the south to north drive initially.

why Reno?
Thats a really long drive.

We're coming into California in a cross country tour from Houston. We're driving up through Colorado, across southern Wyoming to Salt Lake City and across Nevada on I-80. We've done I-40 across NM and AZ before so we don't want to go that way again. We like to travel on different routes. We also have been through Las Vegas and don't want to go that way again. Since we're going to San Francisco too we may just go there first and travel south on a day trip down to Big Sur.

While crossing the Sierras from Reno--make sure to stop at Lake Tahoe! You'll fall in love...

That's what we've been told. :)

go west by Tahoe like mentioned above or by crossing death valley then a choice backtrack up a few hours to cross west across Yosemite if that's your thing.