Big Sur: Highway 1 and the 90 Miles That Justify the Drive

Highway 1 through Big Sur has been closed or partially closed multiple times in the past decade due to landslides, fires, and storm damage. The road runs on top of unstable coastal cliffs above the Pacific, and the forces that make the scenery dramatic are the same forces that periodically close the highway for months or years. Check Caltrans’ current conditions (quickmap.dot.ca.gov) before driving; a section closed at the southern end means a significant detour.

That caveat aside: the 90-mile stretch from Carmel to San Simeon along Highway 1 is one of the genuinely beautiful drives in North America. Rocky headlands, redwood canyons, coastal scrub, and the Pacific below on the left. Most of it has looked like this for most of recorded California history.

Bixby Bridge

The most photographed structure in Big Sur is a concrete arch bridge completed in 1932, 360 feet across Bixby Creek Canyon, 260 feet above the creek. The pullout on the north side gives the standard view, easily accessible and always occupied. The bridge was considered so isolated from the road network when it was built that it took four times longer to complete than expected; workers had to be dropped in by blimp for supply runs.

McWay Falls

An 80-foot waterfall in Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park that drops directly onto a small white-sand beach in a protected cove. You can see it from the viewpoint at the end of a 0.6-mile trail; you cannot access the beach. The combination of the waterfall, the turquoise cove, and the redwood-covered hillsides above makes it one of the more distinctive landscapes in California.

Pfeiffer Beach

The purple-hued sand at Pfeiffer Beach comes from manganese garnet deposits in the hillside above. The colour is most visible in the few tonnes of sand directly below the headland cliffs; the rest of the beach is standard grey-sand. Access is via a 2-mile narrow road that is explicitly not suitable for large vehicles. Parking costs $12.

Nepenthe

The restaurant on the cliff above the highway, perched at 808 feet above the Pacific, has been open since 1949 when Orson Welles bought the property for Rita Hayworth. The food is secondary to the view and always has been, but it serves its function as the place where you sit with a glass of wine and look at the coast. Lunch or dinner, not cheap.

Where to Stay

Post Ranch Inn is the luxury standard: rooms from around $500/night, ocean or mountain views, sustainably built into the hillside, pool, spa. It is genuinely excellent and genuinely expensive.

Ventana Big Sur (an Alila Resort) is slightly more accessible at around $250+/night. Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park has tent and cabin camping at considerably lower cost; book through ReserveAmerica well ahead for summer.

Practical Notes

Big Sur has limited mobile coverage throughout and no commercial services except what you find at the restaurants and resorts. Fill your petrol tank in Carmel or San Simeon and carry water. The road is narrow, two-lane, and requires full attention; pulling over at designated pullouts is both legal and necessary for photography.