My husband and I are planning a trip to the US next year. We’re thinking we’ll either fly into San Francisco and drive down to San Diego for a bit then drive back, or vice versa.
Anyone have any opinion on which is the better city/area to have a car?
And any tips/suggestions for things to see on the way between the two? We’re thinking of heading down one way on the Pacific Highway then going further inland for the way back.
We’d also quite like to hire a ‘classic American’ car of some kind, are there any rental companies that specialise in that sort of thing?
You do not want a car in San Francisco unless you’re also bringing a child or two to sell into slavery to pay for parking. Enjoy the drive down the coast - it’s gorgeous!
You really need a car to enjoy the most out of your time in San Diego, while having a car to be responsible for in San Francisco is a fate worse than Satan’s Hell…
The drive between those cities is quite spectacular. If you’re driving south you will more easily be able to pull over to the side of the road to look at the scenery.
If you go on the pacific coast highway, the northbound is a little less harrowing. It’s narrow and curvy and cars travel relatively fast (from our one trip, back in 1994). There are places where there’s a fairly significant dropoff on the way down to the ocean, and if you’re going northbound you at least have a bit more room between you and flaming death :).
If you’re right in the city, you don’t want a car. If you’re staying outside, you might - especially if you make day trips to outlying areas (e.g. Muir Woods which has giant redwoods - scary drive there but well worth it).
Or, you could fly into San Diego, drive up to San Francisco, return the rental car when you arrive, and be carless in the city.
San Francisco is, for the most part, like driving in any other Big City: it’s just VERY congested. Think about driving in New York City - you’re better off walking or taking transit, but it can be done. Though I recall one area, trying to drive a minivan up a very very steep hill and getting a bit nervous. Most of the city isn’t like that. Parking in the heart of the city can be tough to find AND expensive (I stayed at a hotel - in 1991 - that charged 20 dollars a day for guests to park).
The drive down the Pacific Coast Highway is stunning. But the road is 2 lanes (one each way), there are cars that drive far too fast, and while any halfway-competent driver will be just fine, you do have to pay attention because it can be unforgiving if you drift a few feet in the wrong direction. I’d assume it’s like driving any mountainous road in NZ or anywhere else.
It is a bit safer to drive from SD to SF because you are on the right side of the road and have less places to careen off a cliff into the Pacific Ocean when driving Hwy 1. And you shall drive on Hwy 1, the most beautiful road I have ever been on.
San Francisco proper is very small packed and urban, so a car would be a challenge in the city. However, traveling around the area, it not be a bad idea to have a car (wine country, down to Monterey/Carmel).
Consider the time it will take to drive Highway 1 on the coast. Since it is only one lane each way the traffic does not get up to high speeds, and goes through some population areas. The trip from San Diego to San Francisco on Highway 1 can take multiple days. Consider stopping in Santa Barbara, or Cambria and visiting the Hearst Castle, maybe stopping in Monterey or Santa Cruz, then on to San Francisco. The same trip (San Diego to San Francisco) using Interstate 5 freeway going at top speed would still take ~10 hours.
I just did this drive on New Year’s Eve. There are moments of staring down cliff faces, but mostly it’s not too bad. It’s by far the slowest main route, but the nicest. (Fastest but most boring is I-5 through the Central Valley. Compromise is US-101.)
Places to see on the way are the Monterrey Bay Aquarium, Carmel, San Simeon (Hearst Castle), Santa Barbara. Of course L.A. and Orange County have a few points of interest too. Let us know when you’re coming. Maybe we can do a San Diego Doperfest!
What you want to pay attention to isn’t the twisting of Lombard St, but take a look at the regular downhill streets in the background as the car in the video goes perpendicular to them. As Bill Cosby says in his monologue Driving in San Francisco, "Every street goes straight up; and straight down!
SF is a remarkably beautiful, interesting, and friendly place IME, and I would very much like to visit it again. But I won’t be driving!
You want to drive south to San Diego from San Fransico through Big Sur. Allow yourself some time and take route 1 most of the way and you will have possibly the single best California experience a person can have. Driving south is preferable because then the driver can see the sights too, rather than just the passenger. San Fancisco is wonderful as is San Diego, but I think you are missing out if you don’t give yourself at least 2 days for the California coast. *Seriously *missing out.
I will post later with things to do along the way. How long is your trip? Hearst Castle, Santa Barbara, Monterey, Pismo Beach, Carmel, Malibu, Dana Point, Laguna Beach, and a whole lot more places have a lot to offer the tourist, but if you want to hurry the trip along I will try to keep focused.
You do know it’s around a nine hour trip (and can be considerably more with traffic and/or driving the coast), right?
I don’t want to discourage you because there is plenty of amazing scenery and stuff to do between the Bay Area and SD but it’s a LONG drive. If you don’t have a lot of time, you may want to fly into one city and out of the other, so you only have to drive it in one direction.
I think that was what they were planning, actually.
Check into car rental rates with pickup in one and dropoff in the other city - while we got ours in Los Angeles and dropped it off in San Francisco without penalty, some one-way rentals can be quite expensive.
If you do drive the coast, as noted it is a LOT longer than 9 hours IIRC, we left noonish on one day, spent the night in a town called Santa Maria a few hours north, spent all the next day driving (with a few short stops), and were in Carmel by dinnertime. We spent a couple of days in Carmel, then the final drive to San Francisco was several hours long.
Google Street View has most of the Pacific Coast Highway - one example.
I couldn’t find quickly any of the really winding parts I remembered, though in fairness that was 17 years ago. I do remember at one point, well north of San Francisco when we were driving south from Seattle; we’d been driving on US 101 which is coastal through Oregon then heads inland. We took some state road to get from 101 to the PCH and that was pretty awful. Very narrow, and we were getting tailgated by logging trucks carrying enormous logs (they grow trees BIG in northern California). I don’t think we missed a single pullout (where you pull over to let faster traffic by).
Most of the PCH itself is NOT that bad but there are a few parts where you do need to pay attention.
Added: on moving up the coast, this bit is probably what I remember as being pretty dicey. Most of the drive is NOT that challenging.
Well, you should go through the Marin Headlands (N. side of the GG Bridge), up to Mt. Tamalpais, or into the East Bay hills. The views are fantastic. There is public transportation that will take you there, but a car is much more convenient. If you want to do that and have 1-2 days for it, yes, get a car for that. You could get it just before driving south, or keep the car after driving north.
However, it is a bleak, bleak trip. The 5 between L.A. and S.F. is mile after mile of soulless divided highway that’s dead flat and dead straight. There are no towns or points of interest, only endless enormous farms and occasional rest stops with offering fast food. Sometimes you’ll pass a huge feedlot and spend miles with your car filled with a choking smell of manure.
It is, however, the fastest way to drive between the two cities.
IIRC, we left noonish on one day, spent the night in a town called Santa Maria a few hours north, spent all the next day driving (with a few short stops), and were in Carmel by dinnertime. We spent a couple of days in Carmel, then the final drive to San Francisco was several hours long.