San Luis Obispo – SLO down in Bubblegum Alley

Monterey – The Millionaire’s Peninsula

After Santa Cruz, the next leg of this epic road-trip became quite a busy schedule in an attempt to soak up all of scenic Highway 1 over the space of 5-days. It’s something you could easily spend a whole holiday doing if you needed to be thorough.

Laguna Seca racetrack

Laguna Seca is a world famous racetrack for bike and car motorsport which I didn’t even realise was in California until Gilly the Lonely Planet geek asked if I had ever heard of it, to which I replied: heard of it? I’ve driven it a hunred times (on Gran Turismo that is)

Santa Cruz, California – Hippy surf heaven

Santa Cruz is situated on central California’s Pacific surf paradise coastline south of San Francisco on the way to the Bay of Monterey. It’s something of a legend in name to any of you who have ever graced a surfboard, with world famous surf spots such as Steamer Lane.

Sonoma Valley, wine country and sweet Pinot Noir

Sonoma is the sleepy undersold little brother to the world famous Napa valley, and that appealed to me. We only had a day to see wine country (at least near SF) and so Sonoma it was.