California’s Coast on Route 1

During my four months stay in California in 2006 a friend and I happened to take a different route from Los Angeles to San Francisco. It happened to be the best drive we ever experienced. The drive was over 6 hours long between the two cities, but the view was breathtaking.
This legendary road is strewn with fascinating lands marks, and amazing views of the Pacific Coast line. If you start from L.A, your first stop should be Santa Monica’s beach or join the artists at Venice beach, where you know you are in L.A. From there you should take a stop at Piedras Blancas and spot the sea elephants. This area is the biggest rookery on the west coast and hundreds of these beasts are lying around in the sun. Once you are done seeing the large beasts, take a stop in one of my favorite places in California, the Big Sur. The cliffs here are very steep and fall sharply to the ocean where most of the time the railing disappears. The view of the cliffs with the dark blue sea is something most people only dream of. It is amazing and spectacular to experience. Once you past the cliffs you will head into a little town called Monterrey. Here is where you will find the beautiful Carmel Valley, pebble beaches, and the historic waterfront. This is the town, where we took a boat to experience whale watching. And I got to tell you it was one experience. The whales where nothing that I have ever imagined, they were longer than the boat, bigger too, but the smell was something I will never forget. Most of the tourists on the boat where puking due to the smell and the motion sickness, but the smell was like 100 times worse then B.O!!! It was nasty! Once the boat trip was done, all I remember was wanting to drink something yummy and forget about the smell! From there the trip was ending, since Monterrey is only about 145km away from San Francisco. But the view for the remaining of the trip was still wonderful.
So if you every visit California I would recommend taking a drive from L.A to San Fran, since the zigzag route on highway 1 is one great road trip!!