从Monterey到Morro Bay， 连续开车是5个小时的距离，预留些时间观景，差不多一天可以走下来。

For more of the world’s greatest driving tours, get National Geographic’s new book Drives of a Lifetime. 这本书原价$40，在Amazon上便宜些。

不过我觉得这本更合适自己，还没想着去别处开长途呢，能把美国逛遍就不错了：

一路上没有大城市，所以airbnb应该是个不错的预定“农舍”住宿的方式。

An exhilarating driving experience, this twisting, cliff-hugging, 123-mile (198-kilometer) route along the central California coast takes about five hours to complete at a leisurely pace. Designated an All-American Road—among the nation’s most scenic—the drive encompasses both the Big Sur Coast Highway and the San Luis Obispo North Coast Byway.

Overview
The route starts in historic Monterey, visits the art colony of Carmel, and threads through Big Sur, where mountains plunge into the Pacific. Farther south, the landscape mellows to oak-studded hills as the road passes Hearst Castle on its way to Morro Bay. In places, the road has narrow shoulders and sharp drop-offs, so stay alert. This route can be tricky for RVs or other oversize vehicles.

Start in Monterey
Join California Route 1 in Monterey (Monterey County Convention & Visitors Bureau. tel. 1 831 649 1770. www.montereyinfo.org.). The town served as California’s capital under Spanish, Mexican, and American flags, and by the early 1900s boasted an important sardine industry. Surviving sites include the Royal Presidio Chapel, Monterey State Historic Park, Custom House, Casa Soberanes, Larkin House, and other adobe buildings, as well as touristy Fisherman’s Wharf and Cannery Row, home of the celebrated Monterey Bay Aquarium (www.montereybayaquarium.org).

Carmel-by-the-Sea
After enjoying Monterey, drive 3 miles (4.8 kilometers) south on Highway 1 to Carmel-by-the-Sea (Visitors Center: San Carlos St.; tel. 1 831 624 2522 or 800 550 4333; www.carmelcalifornia.org), an upscale village of quaint colorful cottages, restaurants, inns, shops, and art galleries fronted by a broad beach fringed with Monterey pines. Among the highlights are Mission San Carlos Borroméo del Río Carmelo, second of the California missions, founded by Padre Junípero Serra in 1770; Tor House, the 1919 home of poet Robinson Jeffers; and mile-long Carmel River State Beach (tel. 1 831 649 2836), with its pelicans and kingfishers.

Point Lobos State Reserve
From Carmel drive 3.5 miles (5.6 kilometers) south to Point Lobos State Reserve (tel. 1 831 624 4909; www.pointlobos.org; $10 fee for car), a 550-acre (220-hectare) park encompassing coves, headlands, meadows, tide pools, and the nation’s first undersea ecological reserve, covering an additional 750 acres (300 hectares), with kelp forests 70 feet (20 meters) high. Trails lead past Monterey cypresses, which grow naturally only here and in Pebble Beach. The park’s 250 species of birds and mammals include black-tailed deer, gray foxes, sea otters, and sea lions. Migrating gray whales pass by from December through April.

Big Sur
After driving through Carmel Highlands, where impressive houses perch on granite cliffs above the sea, you reach the start of Big Sur, which extends 90 miles (145 kilometers) south to San Simeon. On this fabled coastline, redwood groves reach skyward, the Santa Lucia Range plunges into the sea, and waves are beaten to froth on ragged rocks. It’s a place of elemental power that can make human affairs seem inconsequential.

Garrapata State Park
Route 1, opened in 1937, climbs higher than 1,000 feet (300 meters) above the sea. One of the few easy-to-reach beaches is at Garrapata State Park (tel. 1 831 667 2315; www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=579), about 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) south of Carmel Highlands. From Soberanes Point watch for sea otters, which are protected under California state law.

Bixby Creek Bridge before old Coast Road
Rocky Creek Bridge looks very much like the much better-known and larger Bixby Bridge, just to the south, and is sometimes mistaken for it. This is an attractive bridge in its own right and is at a scenic location on Highway 1.

Old Coast Road
En route to Bixby Bridge, six miles (ten kilometers) farther, you can choose to leave Calif. 1 and drive the 11-mile (18-kilometer) Old Coast Road, which climbs through remote forests and canyons and offers silent ocean views before ending at Andrew Molera State Park (tel. 1 831 667 2315, www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=582). The unpaved road is tortuous and impassable when it rains.

Bixby Bridge
Much photographed Bixby Bridge is a single-span concrete arch more than 260 feet (80 meters) high and 700 feet (200 meters) long. Park at turnouts near either end to gawk or take pictures. Ahead, the highway passes Hurricane Point, a place of big winds and big views, and then descends to the mouth of the Little Sur River. Looking inland, you’ll see 3,709-foot-high (1,131-meter-high) Pico Blanco, distinguishable by its lime deposits. Toward the sea, sand dunes soon appear, rolling toward the 1889 Point Sur Lighthouse ( tel. 1 831 625 4419; tours Saturdays and Sundays, call for additional days April through October; $8;www.pointsur.org), a state historic park. In a few miles you reach Andrew Molera State Park (tel. 1 831 667 2315; www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=582; fee), whose broad beach, oak and redwood forests, and stretch of the Big Sur River are accessible only by foot.

PFEIFFER BEACH –
Big Sur’s most popular coastal access point, Pfeiffer Beach is hard to find if you’ve never been to it before. The trick is locating unmarked Sycamore Canyon Road. Here’s a tip – Sycamore Canyon Road is the only paved, ungated road west of Highway One between the Big Sur post office and Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park. Once you find the turnout, make a very sharp turn. Then follow the road for about two miles until it ends. Drive carefully – this is narrow and winding road. It is unsuitable for trailer traffic. From a large parking area at the end of the road, a short, well-marked path leads to the beach. Cliffs tower above this breathtaking stretch of sand, and a large arch-shaped rock formation just off-shore makes for some dazzling sunsets.

Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park
Pass through the settlement of Big Sur, which offers food and lodging, and head for Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park (tel. 1 831 667 2315; www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=570; fee), where the Big Sur River runs through 964 acres (390 hectares) of redwoods, sycamores, and ferns. Then go 1.5 miles (2.4 kilometers) south and turn right on the 2-mile (3.2-kilometer) road down Sycamore Canyon Road to the white sands of Pfeiffer Beach, where the surf roars through arched rocks.

Nepenthe
Less than 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) farther on the highway you come to Nepenthe (tel. 1 831 667 2345; www.nepenthebigsur.com), an indoor-outdoor restaurant perched 800 feet (245 meters) above the sea and famous for its views. About half a mile (0.8 kilometers) south, on the left, look for the Henry Miller Memorial Library (tel. 1 831 667 2574; www.henrymiller.org; closed Tuesdays), perched among towering redwoods. It displays books and memorabilia of the novelist who spent 18 years in Big Sur. Also stop 8 miles (12.8 kilometers) farther at Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park (tel. 1 831 667 2315; www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=578Fee), whose terrain ranges from 3,000-foot-high (914-meter-high) ridges to an underwater preserve. Do walk the short trail along the seaside bluff to see McWay Falls pour 100 feet (30 meters) into a picturesque cove.

Lucia, Plaskett, Gorda, and Ragged Point
Ahead of you lies the southern stretch of Big Sur. The road clings to a precipitous coastline, and the only settlements in the next 40 miles (64 kilometers) are Lucia, Plaskett, Gorda, and Ragged Point. From here onward are hills and pastureland. You’ll spy the Piedras Blancas Light Station on a point supposedly named in 1542 by Spanish explorer Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo for its white rocks (stained with bird droppings).

San Simeon
After a spell away from the Pacific, the road reaches the town of San Simeon, a staging area for the five-mile (eight-kilometer) bus ride to Hearst Castle (tel. 1 805 927 2020 or 800 444 4445; www.hearstcastle.org; tours only, call for reservations; fee), begun in 1919 by newspaperman William Randolph Hearst. Perched in the Santa Lucia Range, the 127-acre (51-hectare) estate features the 115-room main house and guesthouses, which mix classical and Mediterranean Revival styles, using European architectural elements, antiques, and artwork collected by Hearst.

Cambria
Continue six miles (ten kilometers) to Cambria (Chamber of Commerce: tel. 1 805 927 3624; www.cambriachamber.org), nestled against hills where Monterey pines thrive in porous soil of decomposed sandstone. On the ocean side of the highway, at Moonstone Beach, look for moonstones and California jade. Drive on four miles (six kilometers) to the colony of Harmony, where you might glimpse artists at work. Ahead on Estero Bay, the small town of Cayucos dates from the coastal schooner era of the 1860s; the pier has good fishing for perch and sometimes rockfish, plus views of pelicans and cormorants.

End in Morro Bay
The end of your route is Morro Bay (Chamber of Commerce: tel. 1 805 772 4467;www.morrobay.org), easily identified by its landmark Morro Rock. A turban-shaped, extinct volcanic cone about 23 million years old, it is 576 feet (176 meters) high and sits on the bay. Peregrine falcons live here. To learn about local wildlife, visit the Morro Bay State Park Museum of Natural History (tel. 1 805 772 2694; www.morrobaymuseum.org; $2). Around Morro Bay you’ll see great blue herons and, from October to March, monarch butterflies in eucalyptus trees.

Road Kit
Enjoy this drive any time of year, but beware of winter mudslides; seewww.wunderground.com/US/CA/Big_Sur.html for local weather conditions; for current road conditions, see www.dot.ca.gov/hq/roadinfo. For more information on the Pacific Coast Highway, visit www.byways.org/byways/byways/2301 and www.byways.org/byways/byways/2475. The itinerary below describes a north-to-south route; if you drive from south to north, you’ll have a few extra feet of roadway between your car and the hair-raising drop-offs to the Pacific Ocean.

—Adapted from National Geographic Guide to Scenic Highways & Byways(Third Edition)

下面的摘抄自mitbbs，还没去过，但他对17miles的评价，我也深以为然。西雅图附近随便挑条小路，就能把它秒杀了。他的排名一二的，路过过，应该哪天好好去玩一下。

觉得最名不副实的就是17miles，但是似乎华人到旧金山旅行去得最多的就是那里

在我心中海岸线令人惊叹的程度有以下排名

1. Point Reyes National Seashore
加州有无数海滩，但惟有这里被称作National Seashore也就是仅次于国家公园的level。有无数的动物可以看，密度差不多仅次于黄石了。Point Reyes里面主要看两处海岸，走一下Tomales Pt Trail，以及在灯塔附近看海岸线，会令你终身难忘

2. Big Sur
这里为何排第二名，因为虽然很雄壮但还达不到，Point Reyes的原始和气吞山河的大气，就好比大峡谷，而Big Sur像Zion雄壮而秀丽。Big Sur的Hurricane Pt海岸线层层叠叠非常好看，是Big Sur最经典之处，另一处是瀑布直接落到海里。

3. Mendocino
Mendocino这个偏远的北加州艺术小镇有着非常特殊的味道，附近的海岸，怪石嶙峋，若是遇上阴风怒号，比Point Reyes更有世界尽头的感觉

4. Point Lobos
Point Lobos和Mendocino差不多，但是感觉还是要略逊一筹,Thomas Cook上说是海路交界壮观，其实还是名不副实的

以下不分先后
4. 旧金山附近的朋友，可以骑个自行车，骑过金门桥到达类似巴黎左岸艺术家小镇Sausalito，喝上一杯，再坐渡船回旧金山

窃以为伯克利这块是看湾区的最佳地点
根据海拔分三个层次，
低 可以去Berkeley Marina走走栈桥
中 Lawrencen Hall of Science and MSRI
高 Tilden Regional Park
这个极端推荐，爬山40分钟后可以见到一个石头圈，视野360度无障碍，前方是整个湾区，后方是国画般壮美的风景

5. 洛杉矶附近说实话没啥特别好的海岸线，Santa Monica和Malibu都比较普通，我就推荐三个吧
a) Palos Verdes半岛上的 Point Vincente灯塔
b) Point Mugu附近的海岸线
c) Laguna Beach

6. 圣地亚哥附近，我不是很熟悉，只知道Salk Institute的日落很赞，Cabrillo
National Monument可能会不错，不过我没去过

遗憾：还没到过Lost Coast,失落的海岸，据说这段海岸崎岖到1号公路都不得不向东折而避开这段。也只能用back packing的方式达到

另外加州旅行手册推荐两个
1. 加州海岸旅行，据说是一个台湾mm写的，包罗万象
2. Thomas Cook的加州，出国那会儿同学卖给我的，向周星驰的如来神掌小册子，那样收人民币五块钱，这里面都是些不为人知的奇妙景点，而且图文并茂，比神马孤独星球好太多了。

上面都是用最挑剔的眼光来评选，其实
加州的每段海岸都是一首歌，每个沿海的小镇都是一颗星