Last updated on November 20th, 2017 at 05:52 am
In June of 2012, I got married in Sonoma County, California. It was a small destination wedding ceremony that involved immediately family and a few close friends having a great time in wine country. Since the wedding itself was a destination, we decided to delay our official honeymoon until later in the year. While still in California, our unofficial honeymoon involved driving down the Pacific Coast Highway to Monterey and spending a few nights in that beautiful town.
The highlight of our time in Monterrey was renting bicycles and going along 17 Mile Drive from downtown Monterey to Pebble Beach and back. Much of the road goes along the coast and affords beautiful views of the rugged Pacific coast, lots of beautiful trees and flowers, and a fair number of sea mammals along the way. On a sunny day in June, there may not be a more beautiful place in the world, with an unbelievable variety and contrast of colors each step of the way.
If you do visit 17 mile drive, you will want to take photos every 50 feet, so renting a bike is a great way to get close to the action without starting and stopping a car constantly. The weather can go from sunny to stormy at any time, so there seems to be a fair amount of luck involved with being at the right place at the right time for great photos. For our bike ride toward Pebble Beach, the weather was perfect and we took tons of photos of the beautiful coastline. On the way back? There was not a single photo opportunity along the same route because of cloud cover and impending rain.
To get the full detail, be sure to view the above image larger. For those of you interested in the photo process, it was shot using my Canon Powershot G12 camera in auto mode and then cropped down to 16×9 mode to eliminate the TRVs on the right-hand side of the screen.
I can’t wait to go back to Monterrey!
Monterey (only one ‘r’) is a great place for cycling around the coast on a sunny day. The weather can go from sunny to foggy at any time. Storms are generally well-known in advance since they come in from the Pacific Ocean and usually have been tracked for days. Storms in June are uncommon. The rainy season is typically November to April and rain is uncommon in June to September. The foggiest months are July and August when it is possible there can be days when the sun does not break through the marine fog layer. It might be foggy wet and cold at the beach if a strong breeze is blowing, but it won’t be stormy with rain. Simply drive five to ten miles away from the ocean on a foggy summer day and there will be cloudless blue skies in the 80s and 90s.
Thanks for stopping by, Ric! Can’t believe I spelled it wrong, that’s embarrassing! I’m actually going to be moving out to your neck of the woods (San Francisco most likely) this summer, so I might have to call on your awesome blog for some ideas of day trips.