When it comes to summer vacations, there are so many choices. Do you want to fly somewhere that is exotic and far away? Or do you want to take a road trip with your family? The decision has a lot of points to be considered. How much money and time do you have? With kids, you may also ask yourself how much patience do you have?

For a great road trip suggestion, here is a really good one. Of course, some people are thinking twice about road trips because of the cost of Gasoline which always picks summertime to go up. Well here is my suggestion anyway just because it is so great and one I love to take.

Drive California Big Sur Highway

For a road trip full of visual highlights, drive California Big Sur Highway… the central part of California Highway 1. The whole highway is dotted with names that show up on tourist’s list from all over the world.

Small towns to linger in, parks and beaches to explore and enjoy. You’ll love to explore the northern and southern sections between Los Angeles and San Francisco some other time, but the most popular section is the one we’ll deal with here… the Central California Coast. The California Big Sur Highway is the section from Cambria in the south to Carmel in the north.

This 90 miles (140km) of highway packs a lot of visual punch. It compares with driving Italy’s Amalfi Coast Road or Australia’s Great Ocean Road. When you drive California Big Sur Highway, you’ll find you’re on a two lane road that hugs the mountains with dense pine forests, stands of redwood trees, and California chaparral depending on where you are.

It clings to steep cliffs above the Pacific on the shoreline side. It twists and turns and climbs over spectacular bridges that span precipitous canyons.

There is really no way to get lost, since you are pretty much caught between the mountains and the sea. There are lookouts where you can pull off to admire the scenery and a limited number of places where you can stop to eat. There are numerous state parks and beaches where you can enjoy a picnic.

The little town of Cambria and Hearst Castle at San Simeon anchor this section of the Big Sur Highway to the south. Once you leave Cambria, be sure you have enough gas… there is a long stretch of about 40 miles (65 km) where no gas is available.

Allow plenty of time… 90 miles doesn’t sound like it’s too far, but you will only average about 30 miles a hour (50 km per hour) due to the traffic, the other gawkers, and the time you spend at scenic spots. You’ll go even slower if you have a passenger prone to motion sickness.

Big Sur and Carmel anchor this section of California Highway 1 to the north. If you’re not making this part of a longer drive along the whole of Highway 1, you can drive it round trip in a day if you want to. If you are only driving one way, you might want to make it from south to north.

You’ll be driving on the inside of the curves, and most guides say that the views are clearer toward the north. That said, it’s still a very pretty drive heading south.

The scenery of Big Sur is the main attraction for this part of your drive. In the spring, the wildflowers are spectacular. Be sure to check on road conditions though. California Highway 1 is prone to landslides during the rainy season which is winter in California.

So if you plan to drive California Big Sur Highway, you’ll want to know if it is closed at certain times of the day for maintenance… or possibly even closed completely into spring if a slide was particularly bad.

There are plenty of places to stay in the Cambria area and again in Carmel and Monterey. In between your options are limited though there are places to camp, a few modest and quirky hotels, and a couple of very high end places. It’s best to check into this before you start driving. If you want to drive in only one direction, check around with different car rental companies and compare dropoff fees.

Whether you make it one way or round trip, if you drive California Big Sur Highway, you are in for a treat.