meg

Planning a three week trip from England in Autumn 2002 - starting from Los Angeles and driving up the Californian coast to San Francisco with side trips into the desert, and to Las Vegas? Any suggestions of places to go, things to see please.
Many thanks

Barbara

Meg, I suggest that you fly BA direct to San Diego and start your trip here.

garyt

Meg- Great to see a fellow early planner! I would recommend you stay with L.A. as your home base and take side trips to San Diego and Las Vegas. These mini trips from LA are very inexpensive because they are designed for locals as getaways. They include rooms, airfare, and often gift packs or gambling coupons.

Once you return from your sidetrips, you will need the car to get around LA. and then up the coast. LA things include Disney, Universal, Hollywood, Beverly Hills, Venice Beach, and any number of others depending on your interests.

Along the coast, take HWY 1, and don't miss Hearst Castle, Big Sur, Carmel, Monterey(whale watch),San Francisco, and finally the north wine country. Each one of these stops is well documented online. Have fun...half of the success of the trip is in the planning.

Thyra

Meg, it all depends upon what you are interested in.
Are you more of a camping/natural beauty type, or a city person?
I live in downtown Hollywood and if you are interested in sights and places of interest in Los Angeles and in particular Hollywood Let me know.
I have long lists of things to do and prices.

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kam

For preliminary planning, request a visitor's guide to California from the Tourism Bureau. Either call 1-800-gocalif or www.gocalif.co.gov to order one. It divides the state into regions and gives suggestions of what to see/do in each area. Then you can determine what your interests are and then come back here to finetune your trip. You might want to start in San Francisco because the weather will be warmer, the earlier you come and then you can drive out from LA to Las Vegas at the end of the trip. Do a search on this forum for many, many suggestions.

don

Meg, you don't say if you intend to fly in and out of the same location. Personally, I would fly into Las Vegas, travel over to San Diego and travel up the coast to San Francisco, flying home from there. It would save you the time from backtracking. Even better would be to fly into Phoenix, up through Sedona and to the Grand Canyon and then on to Las Vegas. It might be a good amount of driving but would allow you to see a wide variety of places. I have driven the west coast from San Diego to San Francisco several times and I think a couple of weeks is plenty of time, you could spend the other week from Phoenix to San Diego. Some of my favorite places along the coast are: Laguna Beach, Long Beach(take a trip to Catalina and see the Queen Mary), Santa Barbara, San Simeon(the Hearst Castle), Pismo Beach, Big Sur and the Carmel/Monterey area. San Francisco is my favorite city in California. There, I enjoyed going to Alcatraz as well as a trip across the Golden Gate Bridge to Sausalito, Muir Woods(the redwoods) and through the wine country. Whatever you choose to do, I'm sure you will have a wonderful time. I feel the southwest and the California coast are the most beautiful areas of the U.S.A.