greece10

I'm planning a holiday for 30 days from 8 Sept. Entry and Exit LA and going North via SF to the Redwoods and south via Napa Valley, Yosemite, Vegas through to Mexico. Then head back north to San Diego, Anaheim and home to Oz.

I would value any advice on great places to stay, things to do enroute between the destinations we're going to see above. We'll lease a car but I would love to get off the beaten tourist track and see some of the great Califorian state. Oh, and I've got no idea how long any of this will take so thanks again, any advice will be greatly appreciated.

tracys2cents

How about fly INTO San Francisco and then OUT OF San Diego or Los Angeles?

If you plug each place that you want to visit into the "Search This Forum" slot at the top of the page, loads of previous discussions will pop up for you. This is an often-discussed subject here.

tovarich

Try this: LA-coastal road S.Barbara 2 days-Carmel Monterey-S.Francisco 3 days-wine country Napa check out Muir woods-Yosemite 3 days-via Tioga pass(chek out Mono lake)-Death valley 1 day-L.vegas-Zion n.park- Bryce canyon-Lake Powell- North rim G.Canyon-Flagstaff- Sedona-South to Phoenix(visit Montezuma castme)-Interstate 8 to S.Diego(take Old town trolley to visit)-to LA .Paul

TrvlMaven

Ambitious itinerary; leave out Mexico--border towns are not currently safe and you cannot take a rental car across the border.

janisj

30 days is just about right for your SoCal/NorCal/LVand back to SoCal - You really don't have time to add Mexico. And any parts of Mexico you might want to visit are quite some distance from the border and would be better to fly to. Rental cars are generally not allowed across, but not sure about short-term leased cars.

Assuming you have already bought your tix in/out of LAX you will have to do a loop. (If you don't have your tickets yet - definitely look into open jaw into one city and out of another. The options could be in SFO/out LAX, In SFO/out Phoenix or Las Vegas, in LAX/out SFO, in Phoenix/out SFO, In San Diego/out SFO, etc)

I'd work it out so Lav Vegas and Arizona are towards the end of your itinertary. Early Sept is still really HOT in Death Valley/Las Vegas/Phoenix but by early Oct things are cooling down.

A semi-reasonable itinerary might look like:

4 days LA/Orange county
3 days up the coast
3 or 4 days in SF
2 days in the wine country
2 days for the Redwoods
3 days for Yosemite/Sierras
1 Day for DV
3 days for LV
4 days for the Grand Canyon/Zion etc
3 days San Diego
Back to LAX

J_Correa

I actually think that coming in and going out of LAX is a good idea because this will allow you to head north to SF along the coast. If you flew into SFO, you would have to back track to see this area, which IMO, should not be missed. Do a search on this forum for keywords such as "big sur" "cambria" "monterey" - you will get tons of recommendations for this drive.

Something to check before you finalize your route - you've got Las Vegas after Yosemite and a popular route is to take Hwy 120 east over Tioga Pass and then head south on the east side of the Sierras to Las Vegas. Tioga Pass closes in the wintertime due to snow - they just wait until spring to plow it. There is historical data online that tells when the road has closed from year to year - do a search to make sure you aren't bumping up against the dates when the road usually closes.

greece10

thank you all so much for taking the time to reply to my query. Wow, I never knew about this site and everyone is so friendly.

Thanks again : )

kleroux

Instead of Napa Valley, why not visit the Sonoma Wine country instead? Its one hour directly north of the Golden Gate bridge up highway 101. There are fewer tourists and its a beautiful area. Visit the town of Healdsburg, which is charming. Lots of very good restaurants, shops and wine tasting around the town square. For interesting places to stay check out www.HealdsburgRentals.com or www.Healdsburgrealty.com (vacation rentals). Then on your way South East you can swing through the Napa valley on your way to Yosemite and Vegas..

greece10

ttt