Driving the Pacific Coast Highway

[catsmeow]

downtown SLO is good for trolling for college chicks. pirates cove is a kick ass nude beach. hiking madonna mountain or bishops peak is a must do. check out poly canyon at cal poly slo, architecture and engineering students have built some really interesting experimental structures out there, and you can bbq there or at the botanical gardens on campus. theres a farmers market downtown every thurs night with good produce, live music, and etc. downtown brew is not the best bar but they have a really good blueberry ale i highly reccommend. and theres a place called big falls that you take a tiny dirt road to on the outskirts of town, (disregard "tresspassers will be shot" signs) then you hike a very short hike, and you are at a couple pools, the top of which has a natural waterslide to the bottom one and the bottom is deep enough (but cold) to jump into from the high cliffs around. theres a ton. and of course you can always go to bulls tavern and get a bull sweat (tobasco, 151, worchester sauce, wild turkey) shot.

[Nash]

My only visit to San Luis Obispo was awful. I got there at 5 pm and everything closed at 6 pm.

[MarkRyan]

As you get towards SF just above Half Moon Bay there was a rock slide that shut down the 1. I haven't been up there in a year or so though so check if they've reopened it. You may have to go inland and take a different road up to SF.

Probably Devil's Slide, it closes on occasion usually in the early spring when rain is heavy. I've been down there a few times in the past couple of months and there's no closure.

Santa Barbara is gorgeous but I've never spent any time there, just drove through on 101. Such a cool looking city.

Monterrey has a nice aquarium.

Santa Cruz is a cool town. Downtown is a'ight, some interesting shops, but the Boardwalk is actually cool. There are some coasters, a decent arcade, a pier--it doesn't have any of the sterility of theme parks or anything.

Might be worth stopping by Alice's Restaurant at the intersection of highways 84 and 35 (just a few miles off of 1, south of Half Moon Bay). If you get there on a weekend you may be astounded at the number of motorcycles that show up. The roads leading there are excellent driving roads, too. Go in a fun car and it'll be eye-opening.

Alcatraz is actually worth it. I've been a couple of times. Bullshead in West Portal (San Francisco) is a must for burger fans. In SF, 1 turns into 19th Avenue and will actually take you through Golden Gate Park, though you can't really see anything from the road. The park is worth exploring--lots of stuff, Japanese tea gardens are cool, hobos gathered at the Haight entrance are cool.

I'm hoping to ride up 1 to Fort Bragg some time in January, not really going to see anything other than the road. Highway 1 north of San Francisco is really cool.

There's a looooong one-way-at-a-time tunnel just north of the Golden Gate on Bunker Road (?) and past it a nice beach.

[catsmeow]

My only visit to San Luis Obispo was awful. I got there at 5 pm and everything closed at 6 pm.

this does tend to happen with the shops, but theres plenty of other stuff to do. most people do outdoors stuff anyway, even at night cause the weather is amazing. and if you ever went downtown youd know there are plenty of bars and restaurants open till late.

[Seik]

Wow. Thank you so much for all this info everyone. It is VERY helpful. I wrote down most of the suggestions and plan on checking out as many as I feasibly can.

If anyone has any more, please keep them coming.

Oh and catsmeow mentioned the Merrimaker dive bar. Sounds cool. Any other cool local drinking establishments? You know, cool bars with like old classic rock record LPs on the wall or something. I dunno something unique.

Also, stormy and markryan, TONS of cool suggestions. Thanks for that big post guys.

[Hot Like Wasabi]

Just make sure you get out of Phoenix asap if you are arriving in the summer, the heat will blow your mind.

[Low]

I'm envious, planned to do this a few years back and got sidetracked. Good luck and have fun.

[B-Ri]

PCH north in LA?

you're going to miss me, nash, calliander, Hero, Opaque, Rhydant and Mannerbot to name a few that are down south.

[SapphirePhoenix]

I want to drive the PCH from the OC and up to Oregon one of these days... Glad that you have such a great opportunity to do it! It's true, Seik. There are a ton of us south of L.A., the drive through Huntington Beach and Long Beach has lots of stuff to do and see during the summer as well.

[Calliander]

Everyone always comes here. Nobody ever stops in Long Beach. Fuckers. Seik, let me know if there's the off chance you do.