Hi everyone,

This is the first time I've posted on the US forum, but I've always received good info from the ohter forums. We (DH and I, both 50) are thinking of taking a one week trip to Calfornia in September 2008. We only have a week. I've worked up a preliminary itinerary, but looking for some comments.

We like to be busy each day and see something interesting or scenic, not just sitting around, but not too busy or rushed. We do like some time to enjoy a spot if we like it without rushing off in 10 minutes, so I hope my itinerary meets some of those requirements.

Also, which week in September would you reccommend, I was thinking the second or third week, but could be the last week or even into October, if the weather might be nicer (by nicer, I mean preferably sunny, but not too hot).

We have not been to Yosemite, and I would really love to go there (instead of Kings Canyon), but don't think I can fit it in this week's stay. Feel free to comment on that if you could.

Thanks!


Central California Itinerary

1. Arrive Fresno airport, drive to Kings Canyon NP, overnight
2. Kings Canyon & Sequoia, overnight in NP.
3. Drive to San Luis Obispo area in the morning. Is San Luis Obispo worth a stop? About how long will this drive take? Then drive up to Moro Bay and up to Cambria, spend night in Cambria.
4. Morning visit to Hearst Castle. Then maybe drive over to Paso Robles, some shopping in the town, and maybe a couple of wine tastings at nearby wineries. Drive back to Cambria, spend night.
5. Drive from Cambria to Carmel. Basically take the day to drive, stop, short walks, etc. all along the Big Sur area. Arrive in Carmel whenever we get there, spend night.
6. Full day in Carmel – what to do? Some shopping in Carmel for a couple of hours. Then out to Carmel Valley for a wine tour and tasting, or up to Monterey? Will there be time for Carmel, Carmel Valley and Monterey? Is it worth taking a whale watching boat tour from Monterey? Spend night in Carmel.
7. Drive coast road up to Santa Cruz. Any nice stops along the way? Spend afternoon at boardwalk area, etc. Spend the night here, either at the Boardwalk area or maybe better to spend the night at Capitola area?
8. Drive to San Jose airport for midmorning flight out. This looks like it should only be about an hour from Santa Cruz to the San Jose airport, is that right?

Welcome aboard Brandywine: I'm a CA native so I can answer a few of your questions. September is still a hot month in the central valley, so the later you can get the better.

Yosemite is fantastic and I don't think should be missed. I must have gone to the other places as a kid, but don't remember them.

San Luis is a cool college town, I don't have a lot of experience with it, I don't know if I'd consider it a destination.

I have other posts about Cambria and Hearst - Love it! Others can speak to Carmel, shoppers love it and it is a nice place. Re: a whale watching boat, I don't know what the whales are doing that time of year (migration etc.) I wouldn't pass up the Monterey Bay Aquarium though, it's excellent. Get tickets in advance to avoid lines if you can.

You will encounter Moss Landing on your drive to Santa Cruz. It's a small stop but there are great places for seafood lunch, etc. I think you can see seals laying around in the pier area. You will go through Castroville, the artichoke capital of the world!

Capitola is a very cute beach town, Santa Cruz is much bigger. I would rather stay in Capitola. Avoid the Boardwalk on the weekend if you can and that drive to San Jose will be very long if you are going with "beach traffic" of all the city dwellers returning to San Jose.

If you are leaving Santa Cruz on the weekday morning, there might be a commute into San Jose you'll have to account for. The hour timeline is ideal traffic conditions.

You might check into the Felton area of the Santa Cruz mountains. There is a state park there celebrating the Big Trees, (Henry Coe? maybe) Plus if you are into trains there is the Roaring Camp railroad up there.

Some may snicker, but the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose is a pretty cool tour. Not sure if you can fit that in though.

Good luck!

As far as wine is concerned you'll be traveling through two of my favorite areas, San Luis Obispo (slo) and Paso Robles (Paso). I think you'll find the Sunset mag article on Paso interesting and the links for Paso and slo (Edna Valley) helpful with good info and maps for self-induced wine touring and tasting.

http://www.sunset.com/sunset/travel/...587303,00.html

http://www.pasowine.com/wineries/
So many to choose from!!! Eberle, and Wild Horse on the east side. Peachy Canyon and Hunt on the west side. Just a few of my favs that are fairly close to the main highway 46 route (east and west of Hwy 101).

http://www.slowine.com/
Baileyana and Saucelito Canyon produce some great wines.

Paso is also known for underground hot springs. There is a sulfur odor to the waters though. You may want to consider staying a night or two in Paso rather than Cambria as there are spas & lodgings that pipe the spring water to tubs on your room deck.

http://www.soakersbible.com/Page.asp?ID=161

Hi Brandywine. I'm not a california native but love it and visit often. I got married in Yosemite this past August and we were there for a total of 9 days. When you say a week, do you mean 5 days or 7 days (with the weekend) or 9 days (with both weekends attached to the week? - which is what we did + labor day - we also went end of August beginning of September).

What we did is fly into San Fran and drove to yosemite (which is about a 4 1/2-5 hour drive each way with not much traffic). Fresno is closer (my "man" of honor flew into there and he only had to drive an hour and 1/2! so you already have a good head start!). I would definitely do Yosemite vs Kings Canyon (IMHO). Spend at least 1 night, preferably 2 in Yosemite. Then take the drive towards SF and either go north to Napa (only 45 min north) which is what we did then drive down the long way (time consuming) down PCH1 towards Monterey and Carmel. I prefer to stay at Carmel by the sea instead of Monterey but definitely neither should be missed. (we did a kayaking afternoon in monterrey and it was incredible being so close to marine life!) Spend a few days there then keep going south at big sur, stay at least 1 night in big sur. We like the yurts at treebones because it's a different experience (http://www.treebonesresort.com/). Cambria is only about an hour or so south from there then continue on the rest of your itinerary. The other option is not to head to SF/Napa from yosemite but straight monterey/carmel and head as far down as Los Olivos or Paso Robles and do your wineries there.

In late August/mid September last year, the valley is hot hot hot. The nights are cool. Once you start heading to the coast, it gets a bit cooler in the day (depending on if there is marine layer (fog) or not in which case it is cool otherwise it's also hot although the marine layer is only in the mornings to about noon or so from our experience). The evenings are cool. Spend an afternoon (if you are there by labor day weekend, there is a live band) at Big Sur River Inn and stop to take a cool relaxing seat at the river chairs (wooden chairs right on the river!) http://www.bigsurriverinn.com/index.html Be sure to stop by the Henry Miller museum too - very different and not to be missed. The one big tip about driving PCH1 through Big Sur is that it is slooooow driving because of the windy roads and the fact that you will want to stop every 5 seconds. The views are marvelous!

Hope that helps and HAVE A BLAST!

I live in the area and ride my motorcycle to those locations often. Your route seems a little awkward. I would not miss Yosemite, so I would go from Fresno to Yosemite and spend a couple of nights.

Then I would head over to Santa Cruz, Monterey, Cambria, San Luis Obispo, and Paso Robles.

Unless there is some reason you want to see Santa Cruz I would skip it and spend more time in Monterey and Carmel. Hearst Castle can take an entire day.

Traffic into San Jose is awfull just about anytime any day. I would drive up the night before, find a hotel near the airport that has a shuttle and have a stress free flight home.

I agree with the others - if you haven't been to Yosemite, I would go there in place of Kings Canyon. I love Sequoia and Kings Canyon, but Yosemite has the "wow" factor. Plus, you will be going after Labor Day, so the crowds will be less than in the summer. I'd take advantage of the timing.

For Santa Cruz, I would stay around Capitola or in a different area of Santa Cruz than the Boardwalk - the neighborhood isn't that great. Staying another night in the Carmel/Monterey area isn't a bad idea either - you can easily make a day trip to Santa Cruz to see the Boardwalk, downtown, etc. This will eliminate one hotel change. And, the drive from the Monterey area to San Jose is easier than Santa Cruz to San Jose. I do think James overstates the traffic issues between Santa Cruz and San Jose though.

IMO--Napa is too far north-will use up time in traffic.
Do the wineries around Paso Robles.
San Luis Obispo is a typical "college"-bedroom community--2 colleges and a big State prison!!! I love it --mainly because my grand-dau goes to college there. Except for wonderful Thursday downtown market, I'd go from Paso -highway 46- over to highway one and then north to Cambria or San Simeon==Hearst Castle .I think this is a must see..Tours can be booked ahead
Late Sept. early Oct--usually great weather.
Scenery up Big Sur coast is awesome...

Your current itinerary is way too ambititious and involves a lot of backtracking on the Central Coast. Skip SLO--there is not much there. From Paso Robles, take 46 towards Cambria, where you can see the wineries. Cambria is worth a few hours. From Cambria head north on rte.1 to see Hearst Castle and the elephant seal rookeries along the shore opposite Hearst Castle. If you do a morning tour at Hearst, you can continue north up Big Sur highway to Carmel during daylight. Carmel and the Monterey Peninsula are worth all the time you can get. And the coast around there is much nicer than Santa Cruz which can be skipped--just head to airport from Carmel/Monterey. To minimize hauling around in the car, if you stay in the village in Carmel, you can walk to all the shops, restaurants, galleries, town beach.

Thanks for all the thoughtful replies! Due to some of your comments about the hot weather in Spetember (plus another conflict), we are thinking of going a bit later, the first week of October.

It seems like everyone has said that Yosemite is the must see NP if we can fit it in. We may be able to try for an extra day arriving in Fresno by evening, then have two full days in Yosemite. I realize that's not too long, but I think we could hit some of the highlights. If I understand correctly, almost all the falls will be dry or just a trickle that time of year. But I take it that Yosemite is still worth a visit regardless of that.

NW Native, thanks for the info on Paso Robles wineries. I think we could get from Fresno area to Paso Robles by lunchtime or so, and maybe get some lunch and then a couple of wine tastings on our way over to Cambria.

It also sounds like if our flight home from San Jose is not too early in the morning, that we may be able to stay in Carmel, and just drive up from there, rather than actaully changing hotels to Santa Cruz.

Hearst visit: the only choices are the 4 tours that each start from somewhere and you take a bus, correct? So assuming that we choose Tour #1 (since this is our first time), after the tour is done, the bus takes you away. So in other words, it's not like you can spend the day there looking at everything, you only see what's on your tour and then you're done for the day, correct? So if we schedule a morning tour, we'll be done by noon or so, and the rest of the day will be free for exploring the rest of the area. Is it necessary or best to order tickets from the internet site beforehand? How long before we go will I need to order the Hearst tickets to make sure we get the day we want?

I need to do some more planning now, and also start checking hotels, etc. especially Yosemite.

Thanks again, and keep the comments coming.

even with no water at the falls, yosemite is dfinitely worth the visit. Bridal veil falls (where I got married) will still have water, even if very little, and you can even climb up to some pools at the top (on your own risk, although most people do)

"It also sounds like if our flight home from San Jose is not too early in the morning, that we may be able to stay in Carmel, and just drive up from there"

Do not underestimate traffic in the Bay area. Especially the morning commute in the San Jose area. If you have a morning flight - depending on your flight time it may be better to arrive at a San Jose area hotel the night before. Between the traffic and having to return the rental car, driving in that morning might not work. You could drive to the airport the night before - turn in your car and take a shuttle to your hotel.

As for Hearst Castle - yes, you can take more than one tour on the same day. You will bus up from/down to the Visitors Center at the bottom of the hill and then you can take another tour.

I would think Yosemite reservations are much more critical than Hearst, during that time of year. I'm always blown away (but shouldn't be) by the sheer numbers involved in the popularity of Yosemite.

I'd guess a call to Hearst etc. would settle your question about how much advance you'd need. For as much as I've been there, I'm not sure about that one. I always hear people rave about the Hearst evening tours, but they aren't available all year.