What is the best driving route from San Franciso to San Diego?

Question

I am flying my family to San Francisco and driving back to San Diego as saw this as an opportunity to enjoy the California Coastline. This trip will happen at the end of April 2006.

Answer 1

The Pacific Coast Highway (Hwy 1) is the most scenic drive. It will be slow going, however, so give yourself plenty of time. The PCH tends to hug the oceanside cliffs and has many curves.



Start from Marin County or the Presidio (check out the historic sites, awesome views of the Golden Gate Bridge from the forest, and the Yoda statue in front of ILM's brand new headquarters -- the site's design itself was inspired by some work ILM did for Star Trek's "cadet academy").



Driving down the coast to San Diego you'll see: Half Moon Bay, Santa Cruz's Boardwalk Amusement Park, the 17 Mile Drive in Monterey, Carmel/Big Sur, Hearst Castle, Santa Barbara, and most of L.A.'s urban coastline/ports.



US 101 is a compromise route between speed and some interesting sites. Once you pass the dull suburban strip malls of the South Bay, you'll pass garlic capital Gilroy and have access to the Monterey Peninsula (if you veer off to Hwy 156). As the old Spanish road linking North and South, US 101 contains some interesting rural towns (Salinas, Paso Robles) on the way. And it shares a portion of Hwy 1's route along the Santa Barbara coast in SoCal before splitting up again.



Interstate 5 (via I-580) - The Golden State freeway is the fastest route from SF to SD no doubt, but it's also mind-numbingly dull, completely inland, and flat. Miles and miles of generic gas stations and dusty agricultural fields. If you're looking for a stimulating drive with lots to see, this isn't it.

Answer 2

in accordance to Google Maps, it truly is 4,677 kilometers from San Francisco to lengthy island city on Interstate-80 (type of a 40 2 hour rigidity) and four,492 kilometers from la to NYC (a 40 hour rigidity) through a route that takes some diverse highways. So in case you rigidity 10 hours an afternoon (it really is really practicable yet no longer extraordinarily pleasant) you could bypass the U. S. in 4 days. Now for sure in simple terms utilising in the course of the country isn't probably to be that exciting. more often than not i'd propose choosing up a guidebook and dealing out precisely what you want to confirm. the U. S. is an exceedingly great us of a for sure, and also you've no hassle looking adequate exciting stuff to do to fill up any lifelike length of time. more often than not you would evaluate making a large loop round California--for instance fly into l. a., rigidity up alongside the coast to San Francisco, head inland to Yosemite nationwide Park, and Sequoia/King's Canyon nationwide Park, then right down to Las Vegas and the Grand Canyon. From there you could head as a lot as important nationwide parks in Utah and Colorado, and then bypass on to Chicago and critical cities in the east like lengthy island city, Boston and Washington DC. observe that you would evaluate flying, extraordinarily in the course of the middle of the U. S.--it truly is totally large, takes a lengthy time period to bypass, and has a tendency to be really empty and is in simple terms regularly dull. Flying is faster and, for lengthy distances no longer all that a lot more beneficial severe priced.

Answer 3

I took the 5 North, BUT coming home, I would have been stuck in LA traffic, so I took a detour which was as follows: 5 South, to 210E, to 15 South. Some friends of ours stayed on the 5 and we beat them by almost 3 hours. But I took that route because I had been camping in Yosemite prior to going to SF, so I wanted to get home. If you are doing a road trip type of thing, then take PCH and see Monerey and Big Sur. Please, for your family's sake, break it in to two days.