KarenInFla

DH and I are celebrating our 30th anniversary with a trip from San Francisco to Portland in late September/mid October. We plan on spending our first night in San Fran before heading over to Sonoma for a day/night. From there we want to take our time getting to Portland. We have up to 6 days with which to explore and would like to travel up the coast taking in as much scenery and excitement as possible. We enjoy nature based activities (hiking, biking, tidal pools, scenic drives, etc. ) and want to make sure we hit all the must-see/do places. We've been reading posts and are trying to plan our trip but aren't sure where to make our overnight stays so that we leave adequate time for stops along the way (i.e how much time do we need for Redwood National Park?). Any advice, suggestions and input is greatly appreciated!

Bobmrg

Six days overall, or six days San Francisco-Portland? Assuming the latter, take SR-128 out of Sonoma all the way to SR-1 on the coast and stay on 1 until it merges with 101 at Leggett. Just north of Garberville you will see signs for the Avenue of the Giants...31 miles of redwoods paralleling 101. You might want to stop at Fort Bragg, Mendocino, or Benbow Inn. Stay on 101. Just north of Orick you will see signs for the Newton P. Drury Scenic Bypass...ten more miles of redwoods in the Redwood National Park. Between the two you should have had your fill of redwoods. We usually stop in Eureka and somewhere in southern Oregon.

If you have six days for the round trip, that won't work. Take 128 to where it meets 101 and eliminate the highway 1 portion.

tomfuller

Picking up from where Bobmrg left off, spend an hour or 2 at the "Trees of Mystery" if you haven't seen enough Coast Redwoods yet. Turn off US 101 onto US 199 just north of Crescent City. If you have the time, check out the Oregon Caves NM before you get to Grants Pass Oregon. From Grants Pass, take I-5 south to Gold Hill and take 234 over to get onto Rt. 62 to get to the south entrance of Crater Lake. If the north entrance is still open (maybe not), exit to Rt. 138 and go east to US 97.
It is 90 miles from the north entrance to Bend Oregon.

happytrailstoyou

Our favorite places to stay on the Oregon Coast are Brookings, Florence, Yachats, Newport, and (when it isn't too crowded) Cannon Beach.

Highway 101 between Brookings and Port Orford and between Florence and Lincoln City offer the most extensive ocean views.

HTtY

KarenInFla

Thanks all for the input. Bobmrg, yes, we have six days to travel from SF to Portland. We've pulled up maps and are marking your suggestions so we can plan our trip - scenic bypass, "Trees of Mystery" and Oregon's ocean views all sound great as do the suggested routes. Does anyone have an opinion about if we should plan on doing wineries/exploring all day and staying the night in Sonoma or would it make sense to hit a couple wineries and then move on to Healdsburg for the late afternoon and night? Also, any hiking trails along our way that we shouldn't miss?

sunbum1944

We hiked from the Klamath River overlook to Hidden Beach- very beautiful. We did this using a shuttle so we only walked one way. Also from the Klamath River overlook there is a nice trail down to another overlook where you can frequently see the whales playing and feeding.

http://www.americansouthwest.net/cal...ach-trail.html

The Requa Inn is just down the hill from this overlook and would be a nice place to stay .

Other places I have stayed in the Redwoods is Scotia Inn in the town of Scotia
Trinidad Inn in Trinidad

KarenInFla

Thanks for the response, sunbum. The link has lots of good info. We will definitely check out this hike, and seeing whales would be awesome!