Riding California - Day One
Santa Barbara To Monterey - 280 Miles
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Click Here For Photos
The first day the ride took us from our starting point in Santa
Barbara up Hwy 154 to Hwy 246 West to Solvang. This is the neat little Danish looking town that you will see in
the pictures. I would highly recommend making Solvang a stop on your trip. We ate breakfast at a place called the
Belgian Cafe. You can see what I had in the pics.
From there we made our way to Hwy 101 to San Luis Obispo.
If you are inclined to stop, there are a few missions that you can visit. From there you will head North another
23 miles to Hwy. 46 for your 28 mile crossover to Hwy. 1. You will turn right and see that Monterey is 106 miles
away and Cambria is 4 miles. You can stop in the tourist town of Cambria for several different choices for lunch.
Go another 8 miles and you can take a tour of the Hearst Castle. Good stop if you've never done it. From there
you will enjoy 100 miles of coastal riding. Many twisty roads and ocean views.
Be prepared to have the leather jackets on and encounter some cool and windy weather coming off of the ocean. But
if you have never done it before it will all be worth while. Be sure and stop at Napenthe at the North end of Big
Sur. The view is awesome and a great place to stop for some food or refreshments. I have several pics of the place
on the site. From there you will be about 25 miles from Monterey. This first leg for us was 280 miles. With stops
and sightseeing it took us about 10 hours for this part of the ride. There are many different routes to take. This
is just the one that we chose. See map below.
