It’s hard to compete for the attention of travelers to California when your neighbor to the north is San Francisco, arguably one of the country’s most beautiful cities, and Los Angeles to the south, which, let’s face it, doesn’t have to work hard to get noticed. It’s lucky for Highway 1, that coastal stretch of Central California between those aforesaid cities, that it’s been blessed with enough natural beauty, sandy beaches, esteemed wineries and assorted species of wildlife that it doesn’t have to work all that hard for a place in the spotlight.
After a short stay in Los Angeles and a stop in Santa Barbara to celebrate the 4th of July, my travel partner and I got back in the car and headed north along Highway 1, better known as the Pacific Coast Highway, to began our Highway 1 Discovery Route road trip. Our first stop was the coastal town of Morro Bay.
The drive north to our first stop, Morro Bay, took about two hours, beginning with a jaunt through countless acres of farmland, where much of the country’s produce comes from, followed by a lengthy stretch where we were treated to panoramic views of long, sandy beaches with the sparkling waters of the Pacific Ocean stretching out toward the clear sky. As we approached town, iconic Morro Rock quickly appeared on the horizon, jutting out from the ground like a giant road marker leading our way into town.
Morro Rock is actually a 581-foot high magma mixture that is the remnant of ancient volcanic activity, one of 13 along the coastline in this area. Stretching out below it is the town’s namesake bay, Morro Bay, a 4-mile-long bay home to an eclectic mix of wildlife including over 200 species of birds such as the great blue heron, the great and snowy egret and red-tailed hawks, as well as many water mammals such as harbor seals, sea lions and California sea otters.
On our first morning out, in order to get a better, more intimate view of the wildlife, we decided to don life preservers and take a guided kayak tour of the bay via Central Coast Outdoors. Founded by former tour guides, Central Coast employ some of the most knowledgeable guides in the area. Leading us out that morning was our guide, Mandy, an ex-competitive kayaker who was thankfully long on patience (her first task that morning was dealing with New Yorkers getting into kayaks for the first time in a long while).
Our first stop in the water was a long inlet through the marshland where we encountered about two dozen sea lions lazily laying on the shore’s edge, sunning themselves under the morning sun. Careful not to get too close as to disturb them, the occasional sea lion would lift his head and reveal his long whiskers as we passed by, lazily checking out the new aquatic visitors. On our way back out into the bay, a youngster dove in as we passed and followed along at a distance, playfully watching as we rowed away.
After kayaking out to a moored barge — now a newly working oyster farm where we watched the fisherman haul in their take — we made our way to the far edge of the bay and grounded our kayaks along the sandy beach on the spit of land that separates the bay from the ocean. While lunch was being unpacked, we hiked across the tall sand dunes for views of the ocean where the waves pounded the beach with Morro Rock towering in the distance.
After a well-earned lunch of freshly made quinoa salad, turkey and tomato sandwiches, walnut apple salad, and of course a couple glasses of local wine, we hopped back into the kayaks and rowed back across the bay. As we approached the water’s edge, we began to hear the low din of hundreds of birds calling out. Here on a small stretch of protected land, the former owners of a nearby mansion had planted a grove of eucalyptus trees, which is now the Heron and Cormorant Rookery, a nesting ground for hundreds of great blue herons and great and snowy egrets.
Paddling up to the point where we were nearly underneath some of the nests, we could make out the chicks calling out to their parents who were busy scrambling around the treeline with bits of food hanging from their mouths, as well as the occasional toddler who was brave enough to walk to the ends of the branch, but wasn’t quite ready to make the leap, its wings flapping in the wind to gather strength for their eventual departure.
Having worked up an appetite from the day’s activities, we cleaned up back at our hotel, the 456 Embarcadero Inn & Suites, a newly renovated, family-owned hotel that transformed itself from a mid-century seaside motel to a slick, boutique inn with sweeping views of the bay and a great location in the center of town.
The main street that runs along the waterfront, Embarcadero, is home to a variety of traditional seaside shops including candy stores, knick-knack shops, and even a small aquarium home to an open-air sea lion habitat. This being Central Coast wine country, before dinner we stopped off at Chateau Margene, one of several tasting rooms in town. The vineyard itself is in nearby Creston, and we had a full tasting of their signature Bordeaux-style wines (Cabernet Sauvignons, Cabernet Franc and their Meritage blends).
For dinner we decided on The Galley Seafood Grill & Bar, one of the town’s oldest and most beloved restaurants, featuring a revolving selection of freshly caught seafood. We started with an order of oysters — farmed locally as a result of the bay’s recent efforts to rehabilitate the once ailing industry — along with the crab cakes made with the local Dungeness crab, followed by seared ahi tuna and Pacific swordfish, a fitting end to a day out on the water where so much life calls home.
Back on Highway 1 the next morning, we continued our way north. This stunning stretch of the highway hugs the coastline, winding its way along rocky outcrops and long stretches of unoccupied beaches. Oh to have had a surfboard with me, and more importantly, knew how to surf properly, I’m not sure we would have made it much farther.
Along the way we stopped in the small coastal town of Cayucos. With its low-key vibe, small bungalows looking out over the beach and main street populated by mom-and-pop shops, the town hints at what many of these communities along the California coast looked like long before development. Our goal for the short stop was the famous Brown Butter Cookie Company. Known all over the region (and the country), this sister-owned cookie company is a working factory with its cookie makers busy assembling the confections in the middle of the shop for all to watch who wander in. We picked up a multi-pack sampler that included bourbon, sea salt and cinnamon flavors, and jumped back in the car.
An hour later we pulled into the town of Cambria, the popular seaside village known for its great ocean views, as well as its close proximity to the area’s most famous attraction, Hearst Castle. We checked in at Blue Dolphin Inn, a newly renovated motel now made into a fashionable inn, complete with six specialty themed suites based upon locations in the world where dolphins are found. The expansive Moonstone Beach and the town’s boardwalk sit directly across the street, and if you’re okay with leaving the windows open, you can enjoy the sound of the ocean as you sleep (mixed in with the sound of occasional passing traffic).
The main part of town is found inland away from the coast, home to a number of restaurants and shops for visitors. We decided on Robin’s Restaurant, a well-known eatery that’s held court for over a quarter of a century. Starting off in a health food store, Robin’s grew in popularity and owners Robin Covey and Shanny Covey soon moved into an adobe house where the restaurant is today.
Sitting outside on their canopied back deck, we ordered the Vietnamese spring rolls, followed by the prawn enchiladas and one of their signature curry dishes, Robin’s Chow, a stir fry featuring fresh vegetables. Following a tip given by Mandy when we were out on the water the day before, we finished the night with drinks at Centrally Grown, a bar and grill that offers sweeping views of the ocean from its hilltop perch, as well as weekly live music outside.
For most people, the culmination of Highway 1 lies far up on a hillside above the highway, out of sight but certainly not out of mind for anyone in the area: Hearst Castle. Located a short drive north in Sam Simeon, we found ourselves the next morning on a tour bus chugging along a windy road up a barren hill, the voice of Alex Trebek narrating the history of the late media baron’s “summer home.”
Built on a 40,000-acre estate bought by William Randolph Hearst’s father in 1865 (later expanded to over 265,000 acres), the complex is comprised of the main building (Casa Grande — modeled after the church Santa María la Mayor, in Ronda, Spain) as well as three guest houses, the famous Neptune Pool and accompanying indoor Roman Pool, as well as a nearby zoo that was once home to hundreds of animals, many of which were free to roam the land. In all, Hearst Castle is made up of 58 rooms, 41 fireplaces, and requires half a million gallons of water to fill both pools.
With the sun beating down on us, the temperature inched up to over 100 degrees as we reached the top. The castle, now officially a California Historic Landmark (with private access for Hearst’s heirs), offers several tours. We opted for the La Casa Grande Rooms Tour, the guided tour of the main living room (complete with a hanging wood ceiling and Renaissance-era tapestries covering the expansive walls), as well as the Medieval-style dining room, billiard room and classic movie theater where the likes of Charlie Chaplin, Cary Grant and Joan Crawford once were entertained.
After the tour, visitors are free to roam the grounds for as long as they want. We took our time exploring the nooks and crannies around the several guest houses, as well hiding from the sun inside the lavish Roman Pool. Had the late morning’s heat not started to finally wear us down, we could have spent at least another hour exploring the meticulously maintained grounds and surrounding gardens.
Back down the hill and across the highway, we stopped in town at Sebastien’s General Store, a former general store and still home to a small post office that can date its history back to 1867. The store is now home to the Hearst Ranch Winery tasting room and a small cafe specializing in burgers made from cattle from the Hearst Ranch. My favorite from the tasting was the gold-medal Cabernet Sauvignon (look for the black cherry, lush blackberry, and roasted coffee bean flavors), but you’d be hard-pressed to find any you didn’t like, especially paired with a grilled cheeseburger.
With the afternoon sun beating down on the coastline, it was a perfect time to check out the area’s most famous sunbathers: the northern elephant seal. A short drive north along Highway 1 from San Simeon is the Elephant Seal Rookery, home to an ever-growing colony of sea elephants who come ashore for one month intervals, twice a year: during the winter for mating season, and then in the summer to molt and grow new fur.
Parking our car in the small lot next to the beach, we followed the elevated viewing platform until coming upon a small section of the beach were a rotating group of 50 to 75 sea elephants were lounging about on the water’s edge, their massive bodies piled upon each other, forming a heaving, massive blob of life.
The sea elephant is the largest seal in the Northern Hemisphere and the second largest seal in the world — their lengths reaching up to 14 to 16 feet long and weighing upwards of 4,000 to 5,000 pounds. From above, we watched as the seals swam out of the water and pushed their way into the middle of already crowded groups for a spot to lounge, while others were content to slither their way further up the beach and flip cool sand onto their bodies with their short arms.
Looking north, I could see Highway 1 snaking northward along a dry valley, eventually leading to Ragged Point, through Big Sur and on to Monterey and San Francisco. But this would be as far north as we would be traveling. Tomorrow it was back south for us. Luckily, I had saved room in my luggage to take home several bottles of wine collected along they way, reminders of the road trip for another day.
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