In July 2011, my friend Esteban and I took seven days to travel between San Francisco and Santa Barbara by bike using a combination of highway 1 and some lesser known farm and side roads. Each day was a little different, taking us through rolling coastal hills, rugged seaside cliffs, strawberry and artichoke fields, redwood groves, and one splendid dirt road mountain pass over the Santa Ynez mountains on the last day. All in all, one of the most pleasant ways to spend seven days that I can think of, and none of it that far from home.
With the exception of one night in a roach motel at Pismo Beach, we decided to camp all the other nights. To keep our bikes light and sporty, however, we didn’t do camp cooking, but foraged at some terrific diners and dives along the way. I did not even attempt to do the tour fully paleo, though I may experiment with that on a future tour.
Taking a few cues from ultralight bikepacking, I was able to set my bike up with only 20 lbs of total bags and gear, including my tent. I could get a bit lighter than that, but not by much unless I wanted to go with a bivy sack and get pretty spartan.
For future tours, I may order a full custom frame bag, which would give me the option of bringing a few more layers for non-summer touring.
The trip started with a visit to Rivendell in Walnut Creek. Lots of cool bikes here and I would have loved to bring one home with me.
After some time in downtown SF and a visit to Box Dog Bikes, we were off on our way to our first camp site at Half Moon Bay:
We had a great camp site overlooking the ocean, but it was freezing (next time bring one thicker wool layer for “summer” camping in NorCal!)
We took plenty of time for stopping at various sites, and one detour into Big Basin to see some redwood groves.
The chocolate dipped strawberries served here must be the best touring fuel ever:
Unless you are a great white shark, in which case these guys are recommended:
The climb up to Big Sur was stunning visually, but became a bit tiresome due to Friday afternoon traffic and the absence of a shoulder to ride on. For the next day, we rose early and tried to get as many miles on the seaside cliffs as possible before traffic picked up.
It was good to finally make it there after 78 miles:
And our campsite was spectacular:
I didn’t take quite as many pictures in the following days as I was getting into the rhythm of touring, and every view was so nice that I just about gave up trying to capture it.
Our brief stop in San Luis Obispo convinced me it is one of the coolest cities ever. Wish I had a job there.
For the final day we were joined by another friend, Jim Warren, for a terrific dirt road climb up Refugio road, over the Santa Ynez mountains, and on into Santa Barbara.
The steep bumpy descent on the other side was paved, probably so that Regan cold make it up to his former ranch:
All in all, we did about 400 miles. Not epic by the standards of experienced tourers, but with young kids and wives back home, seven days out was a pretty good stretch for both of us. I was happy to have been able to do all of it without too many knee and IT band problems, which had been one of my worries going in. Now the only question is where the next tour will be!
Paleo Vélo 
July 21, 2011 at 08:40
What a spectacular adventure! That has got to be one of the most beautiful rides in the U.S.A. Dark chocolate dipped strawberries are my favorite treat.
July 21, 2011 at 09:05
Helps you understand why 45 million people live here!
July 21, 2011 at 08:56
Great blog and great tour report. I’m slowly trying to build up the stamina and strength to pull something like that off. Also slowly building up money to get a real bike.
July 21, 2011 at 13:36
Surly and Salsa have some really cool touring-capable bikes these days. They are more affordable than most, though not cheap once you factor the whole build in.
July 21, 2011 at 18:32
Thanks for the brand advice, I checked them out and they look great. However, I’m a poor college student doing work-study instead of a real job so it might be sometime before I can get anything like that. Until then I’ll stick with my 15 year old hybrid.
October 27, 2011 at 18:08
That trip looks amazing! It looks like your touring gear came from revelate designs. Are you happy with all of the bags you got?
October 27, 2011 at 20:20
It was a lot of fun–can’t wait till next summer to do something similar. The framebag is from Revelate, as it the harness bag that wraps around the stuff sack on the handlebars. The saddlebag is from Acorn. It was a pretty nice setup overall, keeping things relatively light. The Revelate bags are as well made as anything could possibly be. Overall, I think it’s a pretty nice way to go for road touring as you don’t feel like you are driving a schoolbus.
July 18, 2012 at 09:33
[…] from north to south, you benefit from stunning cliff-side views and tailwinds most of the way. The segment I did last summer from San Francisco to Santa Barbara certainly fell into this […]