Honeymoon in California

[kirstyd]

Hi all
Me and my husband to be are trying to plan our honeymoon, but seem to be unsure about everything! We would like to visit the following places:
San fransisco, LA (obviously including a visit to Disneyland), Yosemite national park, San Diego, Las Vegas and the Grand Canyon!

We really do not know how to go about planning this we are hoping to be able to go for 3 weeks and would like to drive rather than take internal flights.

Any ideas would be much appreciated with regards to route planning, hotels, must sees etc.

Thank you in advance

Kirsty
x

[MattF]

Hi we did something similar for our 1st anniversary.

Flew into San Francisco and spent 3 nights in Holiday Inn Fishermans Wharf. Went to Alcatraz, Pier 39 - absolutely loved it.

Then drove to yosemite and stayed at the Yosemite View Lodge for 2 nights - beautiful and so peaceful

Then we drove to Death valley for 1 night where we stayed at Furnacve Creek Lodge - amazing to see, but so HOT!

Then to Las Vegas where we stayed for 3 nights in the Excalibur hotel. We took a helicopter ride over the grand canyon and Hoover dam

Then we drove to Anaheim where we stayed for 2 nights at the anabella Hotel and spent 2 days in Disney - great fun

Then we went to Pismo Beach for 2 nights where we stayed at the Best Western Shorecliff Hotel - great location and there are loads of wineries nearby which we toured. At most it was just us and the winemaker. Amazing time, got to try loads of wine and bought lots.

Finally we drove back to Beverly Hills where we stayed at the Beverly hills Hilton for 3 nights. We did LA city tour, went to Universal.

Finally flex back from LAX

hope this helps a bit
Matt

[kirstyd]

Thanks Matt

[MattF]

We had about 17 nights, so you could easily fit in a few nights in san Diego

[kirstyd]

Another question! Is it best to book hotels with somewhere like expedia or to book direct with the hotel?
Thanks again

[kirstyd]

Just another question - any help is much appreciated.

Been checking drive times on google earth, are these times usually accurate? One example is LA to San Diego = 2 hours?

Thanks in advance.

[kirstyd]

Please help!! Any information at all??

[Rio]

From Anaheim to San Diego is about 2 hours (if I remember right, it was 2002) so I would say its about 3 hours from LA.
We booked with Virgin and couldn't fault them. In Anaheim we have stayed at the Radisson Maingate, Hyatt Regency and the Sheraton Park, all 3 are great hotels.
Love Rio

[kirstyd]

Thanks Rio

[GerryH]

It sounds like you'll be clocking up a lot of miles with that itinary Kirsty.:grin:

When we went in 2005 we started in San Francisco then headed down the Pacific Highway. Visited Carmel then stopped overnight at Pismo Beach. Spent the next morning in Santa Barbera, afternoon in Santa Monica and then checked into our hotel in Hollywood (The Renaissance Hotel in the Hollywood & Highland shopping/restaurant complex - an excellent base for the Hollywood sights and just a short drive to Universal).

By the way, driving times down the Pacific Highway can be quite long at times...with a lot of other tourists slowing down to admire the views:grin:

We then drove from Universal to Anaheim. I've heard of people doing this in about an hour but we caught some traffic and , like Rio, it took us about 2 hours.

After Anaheim we took a quick spin around the Newport Beach area and then headed down to San Diego. The return journey from San Diego to LAX airport was about 2 and a half hours.

We did think about Vegas and Yosemite but decided to save that for another trip.

Hope you have a great time.

Gerry

[kirstyd]

Thanks for the info. It's proving to be quite a tough trip to plan, but i will get there eventually!

Please keep posting any info
Thanks

[Mr_Taz]

This is quite a romantic way to travel from SF To LA, we did it a few years ago and really enjoyed it.


http://www.amtrak.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=Amtrak/am2Route/Vertical_Route_Page&c=am2Route&cid=1081256321841&ssid=135

Jonathan