Itinerary advice

[2littleprincesses]

We are planning on going to San Francisco-San Diego in July 2014. Please advise on our itinerary:

Day 1 afternoon-3 San Francisco
Do Alcatraz night tour, fisherman's wharf, Pier 39, muir woods, marin headlands, exploratorium, golden gate bridge
Day 4 Monterey--see aquarium, pier
Day 5 drive through Big Sur, see Hearst Castle, stay in Pismo Beach
Day 6 drive to Santa Monica, see pier and beach, drive to Hollywood
Day 7 see Walk of Fame, Chinese theater, Hollywood sign, Warner Brothers tour drive to Anaheim
Day 8-9 Disneyland park hopper for two days
Day 10-14 San Diego--Coronado, Zoo, Sea World

Wondering if we need more time anywhere or if there is anything you would change. My dds will be 11 and 13 and do not like large roller coasters. We will have $500 in Disney rewards so I plan on using that to help pay for the tickets. Thanks for any advice.

 

[Itinkso]

Your itinerary looks good!

Did you decide against the Disney Family Museum while in San Francisco? If you are planning to walk across the Golden Gate it's approximately 3.5 miles round trip. Watching a Giants game is fun if anyone is a baseball fan.

Not much to do at the Monterey pier/wharf. You can do the 17 mile drive through Pebble Beach area or maybe add in Carmel.

Moonstone Beach in Cambria, a little south of San Simeon/Hearst Castle, is beautiful.

When in Pismo, go to Splash Cafe for excellent clam chowder!!

 

[2littleprincesses]

I forgot about the Disney Family Museum. Add that to the list in San Fran!

 

[larina]

....When in Pismo, go to Splash Cafe for excellent clam chowder!!

We avoid the Splash Cafe at all costs. Huge tourist trap; overpriced and not anywhere near the best in town (when I live there in my twenties my roommate worked at the Splash and we got to eat the chowder all the time, but it was free and we didn't wait in that ridiculous line). My daughter waited in the line about two years and was really irritated with the subpar chowder. She prefers the chowder at the burger place across the street or at Rosa's, Giuseppe's or even Steamers.

 

[bamagirl@hrt]

my family toured Southern California this summer. I would recommend staying the night in Santa Monica instead of Hollywood. We stayed at the Georgian, which is a cute, clean, and comfortable boutique hotel across the street from the beach. We walked to the pier, walked around on Muscle Beach, and then walked/shopped/ate our way along the Third Street Promenade.

The next day, we got up and headed to Hollywood, stopping in Beverly Hills along the way. While I'm very glad that we saw the Hollywood sign, the Walk of Fame, Chinese Theater, Disney Soda Fountain, etc..., Hollywood is not an attractive area. And it just didn't seem like a place where I'd want to be out walking after dark.

Just my $0.02 worth.

We toured from San Francisco to Big Sur and over to Yosemite last fall. In San Fran, I highly recommend Dylan's Tours. We did the half day tour, which took us to every neighborhood, up to Twin Peaks, and across the bridge to Muir Woods. It was a great value for all we got to see and do.

 

[gatorfreud]

We stopped at the seals near hearst castle. highlight for my kids!

elephantseal.org

I think that;s the website

 

[WiganTony]

We visited San Diego in August for four days. We visited La Jolla where we took a sunset Segway Tour (66% discount with Groupon) - absolutely fantastic area, visited the Safari Park Zoo up at Escondido (50% discount voucher through livingsocial.com and took the Old Town Trolley Tour around San Diego and Coronado Island.

We didn't manage to get to Balboa Park, but the zoo is there which is somewhere you have mentioned to visit, plus a lot of other attractions/museums etc.

Coronado Island was really nice - as well as our visit on the Trolley Tour, we drove there one evening for dinner and a walk.

TBH, all three of us were really impressed with San Diego, and would have no hesitation in returning in the future.

We also had six days in Anahaim before flying back to the UK, and had three days at DLR/DCA. Making good use of the Fastpasses, we managed to do most of the attractions in both parks in two days, the third day being used to revisit our favourites in both parks.

One tip - if planning to ride Radiator Springs Racers, get there quite early and suffer the 15 minutes or so waiting for a Fastpasss - we did this twice when we entered the park, and when we turned up for our Fastpass time, standby times were 2 hours and 2 hours 15 mins respectively!! Also worth noting that the Fastpasses to RSR are NOT linked to other Fastpasses, so you can then go and obtain another. Similarly, World of Color Fastpasses are not linked, so you can also obtain one of these for the show at closing time and still be able to obtain another.

This was our first time at the CA Disney Parks after six visits to WDW in Florida, and we were impressed at how easy it was getting between the two parks - literally a minutes walk, which made it very easy for us to switch between the two as we had the three day two park tickets.

Hope you have a great time.

 

[alex881]

Just drove up from la to SF. In Big Sur, Pfeiffer beach was really pretty. Not the easiest to get to but very much worth it. We drove from Pismo to Monterrey and felt rushed with only a few stops but you'll have more time being summer. Still the Hearst Castle (we didn't do it) will take up some significant time. We wish we had a whole day in Big Sur to hike and explore more but if you just drive through you'll be fine.

For Alcatraz, be sure to book those well In advance. Summer can sell out months ahead of time I've been told.