Carmel-by-the-Sea Travel Forum

Should we fly to San Francisco or Los Angelos to get the most bang for traveling Hwy 1?

Should we have reservations for lodging or just see where we land each night?

hay, there .u better take off LA.and go up to san fransisco.do not miss carmel .I was there in november ,thanksgiving and still no problem with hotels,there is each house is hotel.drive around ,use your magalan or tom tom.look for hotels. many ,many,many options.enjoy.

It all depends. When are you taking this trip? If it's between now and New Year's, I'd say make reservations. January or February you could probably get away with winging it for a place to stay (that worked for us in January one year).

Whether you should fly into SF or LA depends on how long you'll have and what you want to see. Southern California (flying into LAX) has long sandy beaches and lots of people. Northern California (flying into SFO) has some sandy beaches, but lots of rocky rugged coastline.

If you have the time and inclination, the BEST thing to do would be to fly into LA, drive Highway 1 north to Eureka/Arcada/McKinleyville, cross over through the Trinity Mountains to Redding, and travel back to LA with detours along the way (some possibilites: Lassen National Forest, Chico, Sacramento, Highway 49 for the Gold Country, Yosemite National Park, Kings Canyon National Park).

Just a few ideas. Hope this is helpful.
Suzi

Thanks for your advice.
We have 4 full days to travel Hwy 1.
We plan to ride and see how much we can see.
Any further advice is appreciated.
We will be going from Oct 9-12 flying home on 13th flying in night of 8th

Thanks for your advice.
We have 4 full days to travel Hwy 1.
Any further advice of must see would be appreciated.
We enjoy sight seeing and shopping.
We will be there from Oct 9-12 flying home on 13th

how long does it take to drive from L.A. to S.F. on hwy 1

If you just drive, it may take around 9hrs. It takes 6hrs on I5. So i would guess CA1 would take 1.5 times. You could plan such that you would stay at carmel one of the nights. Also, dont overlook the possibility of flying from san jose airport.

Drive south to north if you are skittish about heights... you will be on the mountain side. Drive north to south if you want to be on the "cliff side". Be sure to stop at San Simeon ( Hearst Mansion) for a tour, thats a morning or an afternoon. Stop in Carmel for lunch or dinner,
take the 17 mile drive past Pebble Beach, and Big Sur! Absolutely beautiful.
We overnighted in Monterey, cute town, good food. Make sure to rent a convertible and check out one way shuttles from SF to LA or vise versa.
They used to be super cheap! $49. Leave some time to just pull over for some wine ( 1 glass only!!) and cheese on the beach. Great pull outs.

The really dramatic parts of Highway 1 lie to the north and south of San Francisco.  To the south it is the stretch from San Francisco through the Big Sur (about 100 miles), and to the north it is from the Golden Gate Bridge west and then north to Point Reyes National Seashore and beyond to the Russian River.If you have lots of time, you could go north as far as Mendicino, which is at least another couple of days travel if you are going to savor the area.If you are going to travel before November, it would be smart to make reservations.

If you have time, visit the Monterey Bay Aquarium - it's wonderful and definitely worth a few hours of your time.

During three trips along the PCH, we never knew where we'd end up each night so didn't make reservations but never have a problem finding a hotel room in Carmel, Monterey, Cambria or Santa Barbara. However, these trips were in the spring and fall - not the summer - and in Santa Barbara it wasn't easy to find a hotel room (most vacancies were in small, cramped motels).

If you go LA to SF, when you want stop and see something, you will have to wait for a break in the southbound traffic so you can make a left turn, all the while hoping that the person coming up behind you around a tight curve will see you in time. ( And when someone else ahead of you stops, waiting for a chance to turn off the road, you get to be the person who comes around a tight curve and has to stomp on the brakes. ) When you want to get back on to the road, you have to wait for a gap in both northbound and southbound traffic.
However, if you go SF to LA, you can get off and on the road much more easily. And the view is better.