Southwest USA & The West Coast (California, Arizona etc) - General Thread

Murphy_The_Cat

Rahven wrote: »

Right taking into account what everyone has said we have proposed the following revised schedule:

Sun 1 Jul - Santa Barbara
Mon 2 Jul - Carmel
Tue 3-Thur 5 - San Francisco
Fri 6 - Sat 7 - Yosemite
Sun 8 - Santa Cruz or San Jose

Any comment very welcome, really appreciate the help we have had so far

Santa Barbara to Carmel is 253 miles, but some of it is the nicest motoring that you could imagine. If you're going to do it one day, leave Santa Bub early and plan on arriving at Carmel late.
Or better still break your journey in San Luis Opisbo and explore the towns/villages en route (even if it means dropping a day in San Fran)

Vikki_74

Rahven wrote: »

Right taking into account what everyone has said we have proposed the following revised schedule:

Sun 1 Jul - Santa Barbara
Mon 2 Jul - Carmel
Tue 3-Thur 5 - San Francisco
Fri 6 - Sat 7 - Yosemite
Sun 8 - Santa Cruz or San Jose

Any comment very welcome, really appreciate the help we have had so far

Murphy_The_Cat wrote: »

Santa Barbara to Carmel is 253 miles, but some of it is the nicest motoring that you could imagine. If you're going to do it one day, leave Santa Bub early and plan on arriving at Carmel late.
Or better still break your journey in San Luis Opisbo and explore the towns/villages en route (even if it means dropping a day in San Fran)

I agree with Murphy...it would be such a shame to rush the drive up the coast.

San Jose has nothing much to see really, especially for tourists, and Santa Cruz whilst nice can really be done as a stop for a few hours between Carmel/Monterey area and SF. Also it seems a bit of a waste of time to drive back down there when you've already done that part on the way up so I personally would just skip that part - I am apparently weird though in that I love San Francisco, so wouldn't want to give up any time there!

I would swap things round just a little and do:

Sun 1 Jul - Santa Barbara
Mon 2 Jul - Additional stop on the coast - SLO as already suggested, or we very much liked Pismo Beach
Tue 3 Jul - Carmel (actually I'd choose Monterey, but think I'm in the minority in finding Carmel a bit fake and stepford-wives-ish!)
Wed 4 - Fri 6 Jul - San Francisco
Sat 7 - Sun 8 Jul - Yosemite
Then drive back to SF on the Monday ready for your flight to New York.

Am I right in thinking you still have the overnight in Boulder City planned in there before leaving for Santa Barbara? I get the need to split up that journey from the Grand Canyon, but just to give you some alternatives:

(a) drive right back to Vegas and get a flight over to one of the airports near LA, then drive up to SB - can be as little as $49pp with Jetblue or Southwest and would cut out a chunk of rather boring desert driving, plus give you an extra night to play with later on

(b) Instead of heading back west from the Canyon, head south a bit and follow the portion of the old Route 66 between Flagstaff/Williams and Kingman, stop somewhere on route then head over to Santa Barbara the next day. One issue with this though - not sure what temps are like in June, we went that way in September and it was pretty toasty!

blindman

Vikki_74 wrote: »

Wed 4 - Fri 6 Jul - San Francisco
Sat 7 - Sun 8 Jul - Yosemite
Then drive back to SF on the Monday ready for your flight to New York.

My 2cents

I'd swap Yosemite with SF for rwo reasons:

1 No retracing steps

2. Yosemite at the weekend will be VERY busy as it's a weekend and just after 4th July.

I will be surprisd if you can get any decent accomodation there now for those dates.

Murphy_The_Cat

Vikki_74 wrote: »

I agree with Murphy...it would be such a shame to rush the drive up the coast.


Mon 2 Jul - Additional stop on the coast - SLO as already suggested, or we very much liked Pismo Beach

Pismo Beach is lovely .
We really liked Avila Beach. One road in and one road out. Bliss. & have a mooch around Avila Valley Barn for some fruit, veg, pies, cakes, ice cream, toffee etc etc

If you do stay in SLO, try and stay on a Thursday Night when the town centre gets closed down for the Farmers Market

Rahven

blindman wrote: »

My 2cents

I'd swap Yosemite with SF for rwo reasons:

1 No retracing steps

2. Yosemite at the weekend will be VERY busy as it's a weekend and just after 4th July.

I will be surprisd if you can get any decent accomodation there now for those dates.

Think you're right and we will end up doing this. I think we were worried that spending 4th July in Yosemite would be 'wasting' it if you know what I mean?

blindman

Rahven wrote: »

Think you're right and we will end up doing this. I think we were worried that spending 4th July in Yosemite would be 'wasting' it if you know what I mean?

Yes I know what you mean

There are no fireworks in Yosemite AFAIK and I'm guessing it will be packed so get there early!

Here's a page that gives some options for fireworks on 4th July in CA

Vikki_74

blindman wrote: »

My 2cents

I'd swap Yosemite with SF for rwo reasons:

1 No retracing steps

2. Yosemite at the weekend will be VERY busy as it's a weekend and just after 4th July.

I will be surprisd if you can get any decent accomodation there now for those dates.

Very good point - I would do as blindman suggests. It had crossed my mind when I was posting, but for some reason I had it in my head that you couldn't cut across from the coast up to Yosemite without going further up...duh, of course you can!!

As Yosemite is likely to be one of the trickier places to find accommodation, perhaps the best thing would be to see what is available date-wise and go from there. If the whole period around 4th July is already booked solid everywhere you might need to do some more switching around of plans.

Rahven

Me again Sorry I feel like I am spamming your thread!

We've had lots of good advice both here and on another forum and are now thinking of dropping Yosemite as it's proving difficult to fit in (getting somewhere to stay too). We are now in favor of the following itinerary (bear with me, lol):

Sun 1 - Santa Barbara
Mon 2 - San Luis Opisbo/Pismo Beach
Tue 3 - Carmel/Monterey
Wed 4 - San Francisco
Thur 5 - Lake Tahoe
Fri 6 - Lake Tahoe or back to San Francisco via the other route
Sat 7 - San Fran
Sun 8 - San Fran
Mon 9 - fly to NY

I think you guys were totally right about rushing the coastal drive - I think we will much prefer a relaxed drive up to San Fran and we really like the look of Lake Tahoe and it's much easier to find somewhere to stay. Plus we can check out Carson City and Reno whilst we're there. I know going back to San Fran seems a bit of a waste but we were thinking we could drive one way to Lake Tahoe and back via the other route.

Vikki_74

You're not spamming, you're keeping it alive...please keep posting!

I totally get where you're coming from with Yosemite - we had to skip it on our honeymoon for exactly the same reasons. If that's what works out best with the time you have then so be it - once you've been once I'm 99.9% sure you'll go back one day anyway as there's always more to do!

And I LOVE the inclusion of Lake Tahoe. I am completely biased as we got married there (the little pic under my name is the view of Emerald Bay from the cliff where we had the wedding ceremony ) but it's just beautiful.

Not sure what your budget is for hotels but we had a night at the Best Western Timber Cove Lodge, right on the lake which I thought was very good value - $99/night with breakfast, nice outdoor pool if it's warm enough and the rooms at the back have lake view balconies. At the other end of the scale we also had the nights before and after the wedding at the Deerfield Lodge - hands down the nicest room (actually a suite that was more like a a swanky apartment...fireplace, jacuzzi bath, 2 bathrooms, god it was amazing!) I've ever stayed in but also the most expensive - think it was $269/night :eek: so not very MSE!

http://www.timbercovetahoe.com/
http://tahoedeerfieldlodge.com/

Anyway, I don't want to bore you to death as i could go on and on about the place, but if you decide to head up there and want to know anything else about things to do, routes from SF and places to stop on the way etc please shout up and I'll be happy to share.

Vikki_74

Oh, and just in case you're slotting in that one-nighter in SF purely for 4th July reasons, this article about last year's fireworks in South Lake Tahoe might be of interest...looks pretty cool!