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

Bri1

JPR wrote: »

Carmel
I went here in the eighties and it was good food for not bad prices. No idea how it is now but quite fun:

http://www.hogsbreathinn.net/

Went to Carmel last October, it's now an expensive designer shops type of place with a bit of a parking problem. Monterey was quite nice though.

Check out the Santa Cruz boardwalk amusements park, very retro, It's where the Lost boys was filmed, also has a rollercoaster that is classed as a National monument, bizarre!

Rahven

Bri1 wrote: »

It's where the Lost boys was filmed, also has a rollercoaster that is classed as a National monument, bizarre!

No way! You have just made my evening - thank you :T

Golden_Anemone

Great thread Vikki, I've been reading it and following links for hours - thank you!

My baby brother has surprised us by announcing his wedding this August in Santa Monica. Nowhere near enough notice as I told him but I have booked my flights and I'm getting quite excited.

The flights weren't bad - £544 from Dublin via Heathrow to LAX with Air New Zealand. At first I thought I was going to have to pay nearer £700 but I got them down to this price by playing around with dates and I'm going to be there from August 21st to September 7th - 17 nights. I'm travelling on my own - other family members might come out for the actual wedding but nobody else is planning to stay as long as that.

I will need to be in Santa Monica for the wedding on 25th August and my brother's birthday on 30th August but I'm keen to see a little more of the area before I come home. I'm thinking of having a couple of nights away in both San Diego and San Francisco. I'm not a theme park sort of person so not keen on Disney or the like. My budget won't run to Las Vegas or the Grand Canyon on this trip - they will have to wait for another time.

I don't want to hire a car unless there is absolutely no alternative as I hate driving on holidays. I'm happy to use public transport in SM/LA and can get a greyhound bus from LA to both SD and SF though the SF trip would be a very long one so I figure to have 2 full days in SF I need to travel back overnight.

I can fit in any LA sightseeing trips around the wedding and birthday dates so I'm looking at staying in SM/LA from 21/8 to 31/8 - 10 nights. Then I could get a greyhound to SD on 31/8 and stay for 2 nights returning to LA on 2/9. I'd stay 2/9 in LA and head to SF on the morning of 3/9 arriving late that evening and staying 2 nights returning to LA overnight on 5/9. Then I would have 2 more nights in LA before I fly home.

Does this seem reasonable? Has anyone any thoughts or suggestions? I'm assuming travelling on greyhound buses is safe for a woman travelling alone?

Thanks.

Bri1

I would hire a car & buy a cheap sat nav from Wallmart (cost me $50), especially if you are tight for time, then you can go & do exactly what you want with minimal fuss or inconvenience, I found that driving in California was actually easier & less stressful than here in the UK, people are much more courteous on the roads there.

If you had to rely on public transport you would be wasting a lot of time & you may not easily be able to get where you want to if at all, It's a place that is geared up for cars, so why not use it.

Do pre-book from the UK (I used Auto Europe through TCB & saved some cash) http://www.topcashback.co.uk/ref/bri1 , as you will get a better all inclusive deal, that would be more costly locally

Golden_Anemone

Thanks for your post Bri1. I can understand that travelling between cities would be more convenient by car but I keep reading both here and on other sites like Tr!padv!sor that cities like SF and SD are actually a lot easier on public transport once you are there. I suppose I'm trying to achieve the right balance of convenience.

blindman

Golden_Anemone wrote: »

Thanks for your post Bri1. I can understand that travelling between cities would be more convenient by car but I keep reading both here and on other sites like Tr!padv!sor that cities like SF and SD are actually a lot easier on public transport once you are there. I suppose I'm trying to achieve the right balance of convenience.

I wrote this guide a few yeasr back about Bus travel in the USA.

It's still mostly accurate:cool:

Greyhound
Research where they pick up\drop off-sometimes not nice areas!

Passengers on mass transit\greyhound can be "interesting" :eek:

Good luck.

Bri1

If you are on your own I wouldn't take the risk, I was in SF last October, there's loads of car parking, We got a Pass for the Trams (cable cars) for the day, this also includes some other forms of transport which we didn't bother to use, once you have done the trams, the car/satnav was a godsend we wouldn't have been able to see half as much without it, there's a lot more to SF than just the city centre, drive over a few of the bridges whilst there, great to explore!

Golden_Anemone

blindman wrote: »

I wrote this guide a few yeasr back about Bus travel in the USA.

It's still mostly accurate:cool:

Greyhound
Research where they pick up\drop off-sometimes not nice areas!

Passengers on mass transit\greyhound can be "interesting" :eek:

Good luck.

Thanks blindman, I appreciate your sharing that and especially because it is based on your experiences.

I'm still not convinced at the sense of paying to park a car for days on end but will do some careful research about the public transport options.

One of your links suggests that Amtrak fares are comparable with bus fares but I'm not finding that on their websites - compare $31 LA - SD return by Greyhound with £90 by Amtrak - and then I find that Amtrak use a coach as there isn't a train line all the way! :rotfl:

Vikki_74

Rahven wrote: »

Hooray! I do think I'll print the stuff off just to be safe. Will at least stop me worrying

Any particular recommendations of places to eat in Santa Barbara, Pismo Beach, Carmel/Monterey anyone? We'll eat most stuff, tho not massive fish eaters (willing to give it a go if it's awesome!)

Rahven, just realised I meant to respond to this but was having computer problems at the time (stupid iPad seems not to like this forum for some reason!).

We ate at a couple of really nice places in Monterey & Carmel using restaurant.com vouchers:

http://www.restaurant.com/rdc/lopez-restaurante-y-cantina-monterey-mexicansouthwestern-rid=367380?&mcn=00070821

http://www.restaurant.com/rdc/california-market-carmel-american-restaurant-rid=349965

California Market was especially nice - it's up on a kind of cliff so you get amazing views, food was delicious (best fish tacos I've ever eaten although I know you said you're not a big fish eater) and really great value with the discount. If you fancy giving that one a try, I've just noticed that they never actually marked up my voucher as used so would be happy to try and email it over to you if you like - just PM me your address.

Vikki_74

Golden_Anemone wrote: »

Great thread Vikki, I've been reading it and following links for hours - thank you!

My baby brother has surprised us by announcing his wedding this August in Santa Monica. Nowhere near enough notice as I told him but I have booked my flights and I'm getting quite excited.

The flights weren't bad - £544 from Dublin via Heathrow to LAX with Air New Zealand. At first I thought I was going to have to pay nearer £700 but I got them down to this price by playing around with dates and I'm going to be there from August 21st to September 7th - 17 nights. I'm travelling on my own - other family members might come out for the actual wedding but nobody else is planning to stay as long as that.

I will need to be in Santa Monica for the wedding on 25th August and my brother's birthday on 30th August but I'm keen to see a little more of the area before I come home. I'm thinking of having a couple of nights away in both San Diego and San Francisco. I'm not a theme park sort of person so not keen on Disney or the like. My budget won't run to Las Vegas or the Grand Canyon on this trip - they will have to wait for another time.

I don't want to hire a car unless there is absolutely no alternative as I hate driving on holidays. I'm happy to use public transport in SM/LA and can get a greyhound bus from LA to both SD and SF though the SF trip would be a very long one so I figure to have 2 full days in SF I need to travel back overnight.

I can fit in any LA sightseeing trips around the wedding and birthday dates so I'm looking at staying in SM/LA from 21/8 to 31/8 - 10 nights. Then I could get a greyhound to SD on 31/8 and stay for 2 nights returning to LA on 2/9. I'd stay 2/9 in LA and head to SF on the morning of 3/9 arriving late that evening and staying 2 nights returning to LA overnight on 5/9. Then I would have 2 more nights in LA before I fly home.

Does this seem reasonable? Has anyone any thoughts or suggestions? I'm assuming travelling on greyhound buses is safe for a woman travelling alone?

Thanks.

I was going to suggest comparing prices with Amtrak for LA to SD but it sounds like you already have.

What about internal flights? We've paid as little as $49pp each way in the past with Southwest, JetBlue are another good option. If you could fly relatively cheaply between say SD and SF or SF and LA it would give you a bit more time in each place.

Re. the need for a car, I wouldn't have one in SF if you paid me - too much hassle driving & parking, it's a relatively compact city & the public transport is great. LA and SD are do-able, although more spread out and personally we've always found driving there easier, although the traffic at times is horrendous! It's more getting between places which is a hassle, plus you would miss some great highlights such as driving along the coast. Saying that, your time excluding the wedding etc is pretty restricted, so just focusing on the cities and managing without driving isn't, in my opinion, a crazy option.

Oh and I know your dates are fixed so it's difficult to juggle things around, but have you actually thought about what you'd do around LA for 10 days? Excluding the theme parks there really isn't that much to do although I guess some time will be spent with family & wedding related stuff rather than sightseeing.