Bicycling The Pacific Coast: A Complete Route Guide, Canada to Mexico, 4th Edition

3 of my kids, ages 10 to 15, and I just used this guide book to plan a trip and ride from Salinas to Santa Barbara. I found it very helpful. It worked well in combination with Google Maps, a compass, and a GPS.I was fine using the online version on my Galaxy Note. It was nice to navigate paperless. Take a back up battery for the long days, and keep your electronics dry in Baggies.I highlighted the titles of the segments we were traveling so I could locate them more easily on the Kindle app. A table of contents with links to chapters and maps would be appreciated.I did see a fair number of people heading South to North. They seemed to be doing ok, despite the wind. I don't think I would have enjoyed that ride as much.We credit card traveled, and stayed in hotels and such with the help of Trip Advisor, Yelp, and the few commercial listings on Google Maps. Search all 3, because none of them are complete.I would recommend taking a sleeping bag and light tent from Monterey to about Cambria. The hotel and camp ground cabin operaters in the Big Sur area knew they had us, and sometimes charged up to $300 for fairly simple lodging. Once you hit Cambria the price of lodging drops again, and you can mail your camping gear home if you don't want to carry it any more.Take some nice rear lights to help drivers see you in the late afternoon fog along the coast. We had good front lights, but didn't ride after dark that much.We leap frogged over some stretches such as San Jose to Salinas and Santa Barbara to Anaheim using Amtrak trains and buses. It is a very helpful way to ride only the parts you want to, or to stay on schedule despite weather, illness, or injury. Research online so you know when you can ride aboard, and when you have to box your bike. Make reservations if you ride aboard, not so much for you as for your bike!The kids and I are now using the guide to plan a ride from Vancouver to Astoria in July. I appreciate the book detailing both the inland and peninsula routes, and detailing the advantages of each. We plan to take the inland route. We will camp at least part of the time this trip, and eat out of grocery stores more.I hope we have as much fun as we did last time. The ride down the central California coast with the kids, taking in Monterrey, Hearst Castle, the beaches and sea elephants, and wrapping up the trip with Disneyland and boogie boarding in Newport, was a smashing success.Travel safe!

This book can be either very useful or almost worthless depending on your cycling goals. I rode down the entire Pacific Coast from the Canadian border to the Mexican border and carried this book along with me as I rode. Unfortunately, the book revolves around the planned itinerary for each day. Any deviance from this plan has little to no coverage in the book. As for the maps and route directions, they are super specific that if you don't want to get lost you must obey every turn suggestion in the book to reach your destination. I found normal state maps to be the best because I stuck to highways and heavily traversed roads. In fact the only time I got lost was on the first day when my state map didn't cover the city streets I needed to wind through. However the elevation profiles on each map is useful and gives and idea of what is up ahead.I did meet various individuals who were following the book word for word and they seemed to love following it. I suppose it all depends on what your plan is. I rode much more than what the book suggests for each day but I was still able to see all the things highlighted in the book. All that being said, I highly recommend buying the book even if you do not use it because it gives a great mentality to begin the ride with.

I bought and downloaded the Kindle version of this book at the last moment while preparing for my first bicycle tour, a segment of the California Central Coast. My hope was that it would augment my bicycle specific map from a well known association. The book turned out to be very useful although a bit cumbersome to navigate on the Kindle (that is due to the nature of the e-reading and not a fault with the book).I was already familiar with the route from a lifetime of car and motorcycle travel in the area although I was not sure what to expect traveling by bicycle especially in terms of camping and climbs (hills which are barely noticed in a car can be quite daunting when faced on a bicycle). Between the book and the map most of my questions were answered and it was easy to pick a destination for each day's ride.If one is going to ride the Pacific Coast this book is a valuable resource to carry even if you are using the popular maps. It has a lot of mileage and descriptive detail that the maps just do not have room for. I did find the maps more usable while on the move. At least for the 300 mile segment I rode (Big Sur to Redondo Beach) the book documents some route options not included on the maps. I read the section for the days ride at least once before starting out every day.Highly recommended.

As many have mentioned, the book is getting pretty long in the tooth. It is still very good for people planning a more barebones trip (hiker biker camps with showers). But the coast has developed quite a bit over the past 10+ years and opportunities for eating and commercial sleeping accommodations have greatly expanded in many places. I really like the narrative descriptions and have found the maps/routes to be good (I've ridden the entire coast once and repeated about half of it a second time over the years). While I have a really old dog eared copy of the hard copy (one of the first editions), I bought the most recent edition earlier this year on Kindle, as I've taken to touring with a 7 inch tablet (and a solar cell charger). I can have the book, tons of scanned maps to augment the book, as well as other books, etc. all in a relatively small compact package. But before I make my next trip (Astoria to San Francisco in Summer 2016), I'll plan the route out using this book but then do a fair amount of googling and looking at alternatives in some specific areas.

Useful to look up places to visit and things to see on the route. May not be up-to-date on accommodation. (I didn't rely on this for places to stay when actually cycling the route)

So far so good. Only on the planning stage for a trip in July. I like the fact that the details include en-route hiker/biker sites other than the ones either end of the suggested day rides.

Great book, very detailed. Planning to put it to good use in September, following a mixture of this, and the ACA Pacific coast routes

Excellent, will use again.

Very pleased with purchase