Salinas vs Carmel
 

We are looking to visit the Carmel/Monterey area in August, and obviously are having trouble locating a place to stay.

There appear to be places available in Salinas? Is this too far out of the way?

We would be coming from Yosemite.

Thanks!

Salinas is about 25-30 min. from Carmel & Monterey, and on the way, if you are on 101. (Carmel a few min further).

If you are just looking for a place to sleep and don't care about having to drive 30 minutes to Carmel or having a nice ambiance then Salinas is probably fine.

You are having trouble finding a place to stay because the Concours d' Elegance (car show) is August 16-19. Hotels really up their rates. The Comfort Inn in Marina (usually $110 for the room we stay in) goes up to $329! The event draws a LOT of people.

Salinas is OK. It is a grown up farming community. It's claim to fame is the John Steinbeck Museum. The museum is very nice.

The Steinbeck museum is great. Even if you don't like him :)

There are 4 main areas:
1) non-stop movies about Steinbeck and about the area
2) museum-like agricaltural display
3) steinbeck room-museum including the truck from "travels with Charlie", small screen movie
4) a rotating exhibit room, when we were there it was a Goya sketches, amusing, unexpected and great to see!

I also really like the Steinbeck Museum. Very interactive exhibits. Two good places to eat near there for breakfast and lunch: First Awakenings and Sangs Cafe'.

Salinas can also be pretty hot, and you don't want to do the drive over the hill back and forth.

Try Monterey, just over the hill from Carmel.