San Francisco to Los Angeles

The tour is described in four chuncky segments:

San Francisco to Salinas , 282 km / 176 miles

San Francisco to San Bruno , 27 km / 17 miles Start at the Embarcadero and ride on bicycle pathes and lanes through the city. Continue on quiete streets through South San Francisco and San Bruno. San Bruno to Montara , 32 km / 20 miles The route follows the first half of the Pacifica Cyclocross Route I designed earlier. The first section, still on Sneath Ln passes through the Golden Gate National Recration Area, Sweeney Ridge. Sneath Ln brings you the first serious climb. The road is paved all the way to the top, on the downhill into Pacifica you will hit dirt or the first time. The track over the cliff to Rockaway Beach has some technicalities and potential for hike-your-bike. After passing through Linda del Mar, the route continues on Old San Pedro Mountain Rd, the original coastal road. There isn't too much left of the pavement. Once you are down by the ranger station, take a left and stay on San Pedro Mountain Rd which leads you into Montara avoiding a stretch of Hwy 1 without shoulder. Montara to Butana State Park 49 km / 31 miles South of Montara take Hwy 1 (which has a decent shoulder). After 18 miles on top of a hill, you turn left into Stage Rd and take it to Pescadero via San Gregorio. Then the route continues on Cloverdale Rd to Butano State Park. Butano State Park to Big Basin State Park , 24 km / 15 miles A few hundred feet after you passed the Canyon Rd turn off, you take the dirt road to your left, start climbing up to the ridge. Once you are on top of it, follow it and eventually the dirt road becomes China Grade Rd. By then you arrived at Big Basin State Park. Big Basin State Park to Uvas Canyon County Park , 76 km / 48 miles There is some good climbing through the Santa Cruz Mountains. Uvas Canyon County Park 1.6 km / 1 mile Once you are on Summit Rd, you can just continue as shown on the Uvas Canyon County Park map. Summit Rd leads you to MT Madonna County Park. Uvas Canyon State Park to the entrance to Fort Ord (South of Salinas) , 73 km / 46 miles

Old San Pedro Rd China Grade Rd

Salinas to Paso Robles , 322 km / 201 miles

Passing through Fort Ord , 15 km / 9 miles Fort Ord from the parking lot at the park entrance you follow the paved road over the hill, then you turn left into Engineer Canyon Rd (dirt), turn left into Jack's Rd (paved), turn left into Pilarcitos Canyon Rd (dirt), then head for campsite South of the Laguna Seca Raceway from there you can take Canada de la Segunda down to Hwy 68. You can also take an alternative route and hit some single track as shown on the map. Fort Ord to Paso Robles , 296 km / 185 miles My original idea was to take Corral de Tierra Rd / Corral de Cielo Rd up to Mt Toro and take and take Rana Creek Rd down into Carmel valley. Turns out that you can't do it this way due to private land in the upper section of Corral de Cielo Rd. Instead you have to take Laureles Grade Rd which is not the nicest road to ride. There's a fair amount of traffic and not much of a shoulder. Then you continue on Carmel Valley Rd and turn into Arroyo Seco Rd. Arroyo Seco Rd becomes an unmaintained dirt road after you passed the camp ground and paid a $5 day use fee. It then turns into Indian Rd which leads you Fort Hunter Liggett You better stock up in Carmel Valley. There's one more store on Arroyo Seco Rd, but it has limited opening hours and is not very well stocked. The next store will be in Fort Hunter Ligget again with limited opening hours. Once you reach Hwy 1 you will find stores and restaurant in more regular intervals. From Fort Hunter-Ligget you take Nacimiento Fergusson Rd to Hwy 1 and the Pacific Ocean and continue on Hwy 1 South to Cambria. There's a Los Padres National Forest visitor map with four relevant sheets. Then you cross the Coastal Ridge one more time to Paso Robles taking the following roads: Santa Rosa Creek Rd, Cypress Mtn Dr, Klau Mine Rd, Adelaida Rd, Vinyard Dr, Peachy Canyon Rd.

Single track at Fort Ord Arroyo Seco

Paso Robles to Santa Barbara , 215 km / 134 miles

Paso Robles to Santa Barbara (Camino de Cielo) This route is back country roads from Paso Robles to Solvang, for details see forest maps. There's a bit of a tricky section involving an unnamed / unmarked road which is not on the forest maps. From Solvang, it's climbing up to Camino de Cielo.

A central coast vineyard

Santa Barbara (Camino de Cielo) to Los Angeles 243 km /152 miles

Santa Barbara to Ojai , 85 km / 53 miles The Google maps come in two parts: Part I and Part II The missing piece is from Camino de Cielo to Murietta Canyon Rd. You can clearly see how the road continues when you switch to satellite view. Additionally, there are forest maps for details and here's the elevation chart for all of Camino de Cielo. Ojai to Point Mugu State Park , 68 km / 43 miles The details of the route out of Ojai and into Point Mugu State Park are not on the map above. Here's the profile. Point Mugu State Park to Beverly Hills , 94 km / 59 miles This is Mulholland Drive for most of it.

View from Camino de Cielo over Santa Barbara and the Channel Islands