But there’s no need to be a golfer to enjoy the trip. Golf enthusiasts will especially love the drive, of course, since this small 17-mile stretch includes seven championship golf courses. The 17-Mile Drive is a gated drive that opened in 1881 and runs through the exclusive Pebble Beach community, which is filled with luxury homes, golf courses and natural beauty. We wanted to visit the Monterey and Carmel areas south of San Francisco, which are about 120 miles from the city, so we decided to incorporate into our day trip the “17-Mile Drive” through Pebble Beach. It’s also a spectacular place to explore as part of a day trip from San Francisco, as my husband and I discovered after getting the recommendation from a local. It’s perhaps best known worldwide for its connection to golf - Pebble Beach has hosted five U.S. Pebble Beach is a beautiful landscape jutting from the northern California coast into the Pacific. A permanent Navajo jewelry store is located nearby, and visitors can recreate the iconic image of a lone rider on a horse standing at the edge of the viewpoint for just $2 per person - paid to the owner of one of the horses stationed here most of the day just for this purpose.The drive to Pebble Beach is a beautiful day trip from San Francisco and provides a great way to explore California’s stretches of coastline. Along with Artist's Point (viewpoint number 9), this is the best overlook in the park and has a suitably large parking area to accommodate the many tour buses that stop here. The main summits in view are Sentinel Mesa, West Mitten Butte, Big Indian, Merrick Butte and the Castle Rock-Stagecoach group, plus Three Sisters/Mitchell Mesa to the west and Elephant Mesa to the east. Opening hours are 6 am - 8 pm (May - Sep) or 8 am - 5 pm (Oct - Apr).įilm director John Ford used Monument Valley as a location for many Westerns between 1939 (Stagecoach) and 1960, and one site that featured often is now known as John Ford's Point - a promontory at the edge of a plateau overlooking a large area of uneven, undulating desert land around the first few miles of the Valley Drive, with several isolated peaks beyond. The road can become very busy during summer days, with queues at the major overlooks early morning is the preferred time to visit as the light is better for photography and there are far fewer people than later in the day. 15 mph is the nominal speed limit, and some places are too rocky and bumpy to go any faster, though other sections are quite smooth (with a surface of hard pressed sand), and up to 40 mph is possible. The drive is 17 miles long of which 13 miles is a one-way loop, and typical times for the full trip are 2 to 4 hours. Heavy rain may temporarily make the road impassable for all but 4WD vehicles, however. Although the surface is unpaved, only large RVs and unusually low clearance cars should not make the journey. Various services are available including horse rental, a basic tour of the valley, and longer, more expensive tours that visit places not reachable on the Valley Drive, but still the majority of visitors travel along the road in their own vehicles. The paved road to Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park crosses the Utah-Arizona stateline, passes the entrance booth and reaches the visitor center complex, which includes a gift shop, cafe and the new View Hotel, a timber building looking out over the first few miles of the park scenic road (the Valley Drive) as it heads towards a group of red cliffs in the distance.
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