Big Sur to Santa Monica Beach

Many people suggested Big Sur when hearing of our plans to drive down the west coast so, we definitely added it to the list of "must sees".  Driving down the coast, we anticipated a lot of ocean and mountains, but I don't think we knew just how remarkable this area of the state was going to be.  I can fill this blog post with discriptive verbiage and tell you how we felt in this area but I think its beauty is best described in the pictures we captured along the way. 

We knew there would be some fantastic views, that we would stop in one of the many parks to hike  and that we would stop along the way to grab a bite.  What we didn't anticipate was all the wildlife we would encounter...whales, dolphins, seals and zebras.  Yeah, zebras!

As we almost were to LA, we hit Santa Monica and its is three-mile long beach that draws people from all over the world.  It is just outside of LA and has plenty of activities to keep you at the beach all day long inckuding sand volleyball, bike rentals, walking paths, restaurants and hotels along the beachfront.

Santa Monica Pier view of a kiting event on Santa Monica Beach

Random beach off Hwy 1 where elephant seals occupy the beach.  These seals are much larger than Harbor seals and almost became extinct at one point.  This beach is one of the only places you can see them in the entire world.

Elephant seals: Huge, stinky and fun to watch.

The house of a wealthy couple used to sit here near Julia Pfiffer Burns State Park.  Could you imagine waking up to this view every morning?  The next picture is the view seen from its bedroom.  Remnants of this home's foundation can still be seen today.  This is the couple who named the state park in memory of their friend, Julia Pfiffer Burns

Mcway Falls drops 80 feet into the Pacific Ocean.  Well, it used to drop directly into the ocean before a historical storm changed the landscape.  It now drops into the sand first.  Technically.

A difficult view from the road but, at the top of the hill, Hearst Castle can be seen.  We also had the pleasure of seeing many of Hurst's zebras along the hill side.  As a matter of fact, it was a zebra sighting that stopped us dead in our tracts along the highway.  "Did I just see a zebra?".  We saw about a half dozen of them.  Never saw one outside the confines of a zoo.

The view around every corner was beyond breathtaking.  We must of pulled off the road 30 times to get out of the car, look around and challenge ourselves to find a bad view.  We never found one.