Planning for 2004

[pegasusEH]

We have never been to the West Coast before but are hoping to book a 3 centre trip fairly soon taking in San Francisco, Las Vegas and Los Angeles.

We have loads of questions.

So far, having checked out when to go, we are thinking late Sept/early Oct. Anyone have any thoughts on that?

In San Francisco, we are planning on doing a city tour taking in the Golden Gate Bridge, a visit to Fisherman's Wharf & Alcatraz. Also considering a day trip to Yosemite. We will only have four days in SF. Is Yosemite in a day too tiring? Are there any must sees/dos in SF?

We will then have 4 days in Las Vegas and are planning on spending one day visiting the Grand Canyon. We would like to book this trip before we go. Can anyone recommend a tour operator? Ideally, we would like to go by helicopter with a horse ride into the Canyon.

Finally we will have 6 days in Los Angeles. Of course we will be going to Disneyland and Universal Studios. With six days to fill, we could do with some other ideas. We would possibly like to visit San Diego Zoo but are not sure if this will be too far. We won't have our own car - are organised trips available to book.

Will the cost of eating out be similar to Orlando? We are not gourmet fans and enjoy places like Perkins, Ihop, steakhouses - also just love filling up on an all-u-can eat buffet breakfasts!

Having been used to the very casual dress code in Orlando (shorts & T'shirts 24/7), what should we prepare for on the West Coast?

Look forward to receiving any comments/advice/recommendations from you all.

 

[din]

pegasusEH

I can try to answer some of your questions. Yosemite will be about 4-5 hours one way drive from the city, asumming good traffic conditions. It will be along day and you will not have time in Yosemite to see all the sights. If you are looking to visit natural areas, I would suggest the Muir WOods national park where you can see giant redwoods, or visit Point Reyes Nation Park where you can see the coast line of California and also see how an earthquake move the fence from one location to another location. Bothe of these are in the north bay across the golden gate bridge. BTW northern california beaches are not for swiming.

The weather in San Francisco in October is actually among the best with cool nights andwarm days. But remember to dress in layers andthe bay area can have temp swing in the range of 30-35 degress F, meaning day can be 70s and evening in the 40s.

You can visit San Diego while in LA but the best is that you get a car, for that matter a car in SF will be most helpful. SD is 2 hour from DL. So you can use that a s reference. Visit the wild animal park and it is similar to Animal Kingdom in WDW.

Food is the same for the restaurants you listed. In LA there are some great Mexican food and in SF good Asian food. In the south bay Indian food but since you are from the UK you can get the same there.

Have fun!!!

 

[rrobalew]

I lived in San Diego for 4 years and have now lived in San Jose (about an hour south of San Francisco) for about 4 years as well. So I'll try to help you out. Hopefully there's not a message size limit on this board

- For all California locations, you're likely to be wearing shorts and light clothes in the afternoon, but wishing you had longs pants and long sleeves earlier in the morning and at night. Same goes for Las Vegas, with an even greater variance in temperature between night and day. So pack and dress to accomodate this. And the temperature in San Francisco varies quite a bit daily depending on how much fog shows up and how long it takes for it to burn off, if it does at all. You also shouldn't have to worry about rain this time of year. Dress is casual everywhere except for the odd high-end restaurant.
- If your plans have you doing Alcatraz on a weekend, be sure to buy tickets the day before your trip. This very often sells out. It also might not be a bad idea on a weekday.
- Fisherman's Wharf is a lot of fun, but to me many of the restaurants are overpriced for what you get (which I guess is true of any tourist area). Rather than the restaurants, I'd recommend "grazing" through the various food stands. For example, fresh dungeness crab at the Fisherman's Wharf "crab pots", and clam chowder in a sourdough bread bowl at Pier 39 closeby (which you can eat while watching another tourist attraction - the sea lions fighting over the best sunning spot on the docks). For sit-down restaurants, I've had better luck at Ghiradelli Square, just north of Fisherman's Wharf. Oh, and for burgers and fries, forget McDonalds and make sure to try Inn-N-Out Burger which I think now has a location at the wharf.
- I'll probably get flamed for this, but having been to both the San Francisco Zoo and the San Diego Zoo numerous times, I actually like the San Francisco Zoo better. Other than great hippo and polar bear exhibits, the San Diego Zoo doesn't have much that the San Francisco Zoo doesn't have. The San Diego Zoo requires a lot of walking up and down fairly steep hills and at many of the exhibits you can't even see the animals. At the San Francisco Zoo, the animals are almost always visible and walking is much less strenuous.
- The cable cars are one of the "must do" San Francisco things and are a lot fun. It lets you appreciate just how steep some of the San Francisco roads are without having your legs refuse to move the next day. Riding from Fisherman's Wharf to Union Square and back won't take too long if you do it early in the morning. Later in the day the lines can get very long. For the best ride, stand on the side of the car rather than sitting inside.
- Yosemite is amazing, and I can't imagine telling anyone NOT to go. However, one day would be pretty tough. Also, at the time of year you're going, the waterfalls will be dry or barely a trickle at best (the falls are fed by melting snow, all of which falls in the winter months). But even without the waterfalls, Yosmite is breathtaking. If you take a tour bus and are subject to motion sickness, be sure to take some Dramamine before the ride. I've driven behind many of these tour busses, feeling sorry for the suckers...uh, tourists...inside as the bus whips around the winding mountain roads, obviously in a hurry trying to get there and back in one day. If at all possible, I'd try to stay one night inside the park. If you do make it, I highly recommend lunch at the Ahwahnee hotel. The architecture is gorgeous and the dining room is absolutely beautiful. And, unlike dinner, lunch is almost affordable. They have brunch on Sunday, however, so you might only want to do this another day of the week.
- Muir Woods is an hour or two north of San Francisco and would be a "must see" if you've never seen redwood trees (which I guess you haven't if you've never been to the west coast) and don't think you'll make it to Yosemite. I've seen a number of day tours for this leaving from San Francisco.
- While in Las Vegas, if you find yourself looking for something to do, a tour of the Hoover Dam is quite impressive. I think there are 1/2 day tours.
- As for San Diego, you could easily spend several days there. If you're just planning on driving down for one day, I'd recommend the Wild Animal Park over the Zoo. I've already mentioned my biases against the Zoo. The Animal Park and Zoo are both part of the same organization. The Animal Park is about 45 minutes north of San Diego, and is therefore that much closer to Disneyland. The two highlights are the 50 minute train ride around very large enclosures where the animals roam together, and the walking "safari" that includes an overlook where you can feed giraffes, which makes for a very unique experience and photo op. There's also photo tours where you ride in trucks through the large animal enclosures, but I'm not sure how far in advance you have to make reservations for these. For the train ride, try to get to the park early and do this first to avoid a long wait.
- If you do the San Diego Zoo, you might also want to look into other attractions at Balboa Park, which the Zoo is part of. The rest of Balboa Park contains museums which might be worth a visit depending on your interests. For example, there's a model train museum which my train-fanatic friends always said was great.
- I assume you're flying between all of your destinations, but for anyone doing a one-time trip to the west coast, I always have to recommend driving along the coast from San Francisco to Los Angeles. The drive is spectactular with lots of sights to see along the way. You could do it in one day if you had to and started early enough and you could also easily spend several days. But since this probably isn't an option, I guess I won't elaborate on all of the great things you'll be missing :-(

 

[MateasMom]

Personally, I'd add more days to San Francisco and San Diego and do Vegas on another trip. There's SO MUCH to do in San Francisco and surrounding areas, I can't imagine alotting it only as many days as Vegas (unless you love to gamble). Vegas is a cheapy vacation that can be done fairly inexpensively on it's own.