I'm back to blogging to keep anyone who wants to keep up to date on my travel along the CA coast in summer of 2018! To begin, I've been hoping to ride the California coast from San Francisco to LA for about as long as I've been riding a bike any distance- so about 45 years or thereabouts. It's one of those cycling "bucket-list rides" that begin to get irresistible at my age ;-) The route generally follows CA Rt. 1 the whole way, or it would, were it not for a landslide that is currently blocking a stretch of Rt. 1 just north of San Simeon, roughly mid-way between SF & LA. While that may sound like a deal-breaker, it's actually something of an opportunity ;-) Because it's currently not easy to drive uninterrupted along the coast, a lot of thru-tourist traffic, particularly big RV's, are avoiding this part of Rt. 1, leaving much of the way between Monterey and Santa Barbara pretty light on traffic, at least in comparison to years past with a completely open road!
The down side for me, is that I need to detour mid-way over the coast range to Paso Robles, then back out to the coast the next day, roughly 100 miles out of the most direct route, and over 5000' of additional climbing. Fortunately, I don't mind going uphill, and the scenery through live-oak groves & vineyards is almost as nice as the coast ;-)
So... what do I have planned? Here's the itinerary:
- July 13: Arrive in San Francisco with Norma
- July 14: Short shakedown ride over the Golden Gate
- July 15: San Francisco to Santa Cruz
- July 16: Santa Cruz to Big Sur
- July 17: Big Sur to Paso Robles
- July 18: Paso Robles to Morro Bay
- July 19: Morro Bay to Los Alamos
- July 20: Los Alamos to Santa Barbara
- July 21: Santa Barbara to Manhattan Beach (LA)
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