Why this ride
1605 km from San Francisco to San Francisco, about 21 h 48 of riding. On the way it passes Monterey, Big Sur, San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara. It suits an unhurried touring pace.
CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Pacific Coast Highway, California State Route 1
Plan this ride
- Recorded distance
- 1605 km
- Riding-time estimate
- 21 h 48
- Journey
- One way; return travel is separate
Distance and timing basis
The recorded total and the leg detail need reconciliation. Inspect the leg notes before using this record for timing or navigation. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
Road summary
A coastal highway from San Francisco, California to Dana Point, California, via Monterey. Key character: ocean cliffs; beaches; redwoods. Surface: paved.
Scenic road chapters
Pacific Coast Highway
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For 47 km this is Pacific Coast Highway, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Chapter facts
- Length
- 47 km
- Named road
- Pacific Coast Highway
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. San Francisco
San Francisco hits you with its hills first. The city sits on the tip of a peninsula between the Pacific and the bay, and the streets climb and drop at angles that make a fully laden motorcycle feel like a mountain goat. The Golden Gate Bridge, completed in 1937, spans the mouth of the bay in International Orange paint, and when the fog rolls in from the Pacific, as it often does in summer, the towers rise out of the white like something from a dream.
Read the complete San Francisco write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
San Francisco is where the day begins. Next is Monterey.
2. Monterey
Monterey is a town with a layered past, and the best way to read it is to walk from the old adobe buildings of the first capital of Spanish and Mexican California to the shiny aquarium on the water's edge. Spanish explorers anchored in the bay in the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries, and Monterey served as the capital under Spain, then Mexico, and briefly under the United States. Colton Hall, where California's first constitution was drafted in 1849, still stands in the middle of town.
Read the complete Monterey write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Monterey comes up 140 km in. Next is Big Sur.
3. Big Sur
Big Sur is not a town but a stretch of coast, about ninety miles of steep mountains dropping into the Pacific between Carmel and San Simeon, with a few clusters of buildings in between. The Santa Lucia Mountains rise straight from the sea to more than a thousand metres, so the land has almost no flat ground, and the only road is Highway 1, built in the 1930s by convicts and workers who cut a ledge in the cliff. Before that, the coast was reachable only by track or boat, and it still feels remote.
Read the complete Big Sur write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
279 km in you reach Big Sur. Next is San Luis Obispo.
4. San Luis Obispo
San Luis Obispo is a small city of about forty-seven thousand people, halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco, and for riders on the coast it is a natural place to rest. It lies in a valley of the Santa Lucia foothills, a short way inland from the Pacific, with hills of oak and grass rising on all sides. Franciscan friar Junipero Serra founded Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa here in 1772, and the mission church still stands on the central plaza, next to a creek that runs through the downtown.
Read the complete San Luis Obispo write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
San Luis Obispo, early in the day. Next is Santa Barbara.
5. Santa Barbara
The Pacific Coast Highway has a way of ending in places that look like film sets, and Santa Barbara is the best of them. The city sits on a narrow shelf of land between the Santa Ynez Mountains and the ocean, facing south, which is unusual on the Californian coast, so the sun seems to hang over the water in the afternoon. The red tile roofs, white stucco walls and arched arcades are not an accident. After an earthquake in 1925 destroyed much of downtown, the city rebuilt in a unified Spanish Colonial Revival style, and the result is a place that feels more like Andalusia than Los Angeles.
Read the complete Santa Barbara write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Santa Barbara sits at 558 km, about halfway. Next is Malibu.
6. Malibu
Twenty-one miles of the Pacific Coast Highway pass through Malibu, and most of them are within sight of the sea. The road squeezes between the steep brown slopes of the Santa Monica Mountains and a narrow ribbon of sand, a mix of beach houses, small plazas, surf breaks and sudden gaps with a view over the water. The town itself has about thirteen thousand people, a city of film stars and surfers, and a strong feeling of being at the edge of something. It was once a ranch owned by the Rindge family, who held off development for decades, and the land was divided only in the 1920s, after the state forced a public road through it.
Read the complete Malibu write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Malibu comes up 698 km in. Next is Dana Point.
7. Dana Point
Dana Point has a better claim to literary fame than most harbour towns in Orange County. In 1835 a young Harvard dropout named Richard Henry Dana Jr. spent months hauling cow hides on this stretch of the California coast as a common sailor, and he later wrote it up as Two Years Before the Mast. He described the bluff here as the only romantic spot on the coast, and the town took his name. Today the bluff holds a headland park and a harbour full of yachts, and a replica tall ship sits at the dock as a reminder of the age of hide and tallow.
Read the complete Dana Point write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
838 km in you reach Dana Point. Next is back through Malibu.
8. back through Malibu
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Malibu write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through Malibu, about halfway. Next is back through Santa Barbara.
9. back through Santa Barbara
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Santa Barbara write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through Santa Barbara sits at 1117 km, about halfway. Next is back through San Luis Obispo.
10. back through San Luis Obispo
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete San Luis Obispo write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through San Luis Obispo comes up 1256 km in. Next is back through Big Sur.
11. back through Big Sur
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Big Sur write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
1396 km in you reach back through Big Sur. Next is back through Monterey.
12. back through Monterey
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Monterey write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through Monterey, late in the day. Next is San Francisco.
13. San Francisco
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete San Francisco write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
San Francisco closes the day.