Forty Years on
One Headland

• the 101 north · ~90 mi, ~2h · leave on 100%
• 🔴 check the Caltrans Highway 1 status before leaving
• coffee before Ventura

Up the coast through Ventura with the sea on the left most of the way. Check the road before committing: a Big Sur closure means turning this into a different trip, not a slower one. Every charge on this page is planned for the car driven hard rather than for the number on the screen, which is why there are six of them.

• Santa Barbara, CA – Anacapa Street Supercharger · 621 Anacapa St · 12 stalls, 250 kW
• arriving on about 45% · 🔴 stay plugged in to 90%, ~25 min
• 0.5 mi from the courthouse door — walk from the stall, move the car at 90%

The stall is a short walk down Anacapa from the tower, so this costs almost nothing: plug in, start on the courthouse, walk back at 90% to move the car. The next leg to Morro Bay is 106–115 miles and needs it.

• City Lot 7 · street meters are capped at 75 min and this stop is longer
• free entry · open daily, elevator to the deck · opens 10:00 at weekends
• late morning, hard sun on white stucco

1929, Spanish revival, arranged around a sunken garden, with an open observation deck at the top of the clock tower. Hard sun is right here: white walls, black arch shadows, no midtones. The frame from the deck is the red-tile roofscape compressed flat on the 90V, mountains behind it. Downstairs, the arcade is a corridor of repeating arches.

• the 101 north · ~106 mi
• eat in Cambria or San Simeon on the next stretch
• fast, inland and unremarkable — the coast starts after this

The dull half of the long middle, taken quickly so the good half is not rushed. The 101 runs inland to San Luis Obispo before Highway 1 turns for the water.

• Morro Bay Supercharger · 390 Morro Bay Blvd · 8 stalls, 325 kW · 0.5 mi off the 1
• 🔴 to 100%, ~45–50 min from about 25% — the next charge is 125 miles away in Pacific Grove
• 🔴 Big Sur has one 72 kW site and nothing else for 90 miles

This is the one that matters on this leg. North of Morro Bay the coast gives you eight slow (72 kW) stalls at Ventana and then nothing until the Monterey Peninsula, on a road with no shortcuts and no cell service to sort it out. Fill it all the way in the dead middle of the afternoon; that buys the whole Big Sur run and Bixby on top.

• Highway 1 north · ~105 mi
• the coast road is slow and worth every minute
• no fuel, no charging and little signal for 90 of it

The stretch people come for: cliffs, hairpins, and no shoulder to speak of. It cannot be rushed and should not be — which is the other reason to have left Morro Bay full.

• Highway 1, roadside pullouts either side
• free · north pullout for the classic angle · one-way control at Rocky Creek, 1 mi north
• late afternoon rakes across the canyon

1932, a single concrete arch across a steep canyon mouth, with the road curving away on both sides. Everyone has this picture, which is the interesting problem: the frame worth trying is the canyon rather than the bridge — drop the deck to the top edge and let the drop underneath do the work. Late sun comes down the canyon and separates the arch from the shadow behind it.

• Highway 1 north · ~15 mi, ~35 min
• camera batteries on charge tonight

The last stretch, arriving in the dark in winter. Somewhere to sleep in Carmel or Monterey puts the reserve gate twenty minutes away in the morning.

• Pacific Grove, CA Supercharger · 200 Country Club Gate Center · 12 stalls, 250 kW · open 24/7
• arriving on about 25% after 125 miles from Morro Bay
• 🔴 to at least 60%, ~20 min — or Monterey, Del Monte Center, 14 stalls

Not optional, and tonight rather than tomorrow: the gate opens at eight and the car should not be the reason you are late to it. Sixty percent covers both days of the reserve with room to spare.

• Point Lobos State Natural Reserve · Highway 1 south of Carmel
• no booking exists · $10 per vehicle at the gate
• gate 08:00–19:00, last entry 18:30 · 150 spaces and they fill

Arrive at opening. There is no reservation system — it is $10 a vehicle at the gate and first come. That is exactly why the hour matters: a hundred and fifty spaces serve about a million visitors a year, and once the lots fill they hold cars out on Highway 1 until someone leaves.

• walk anywhere · the loop trails are short and connect
• Cypress Grove, Weston Beach, the tide pools, China Cove
• morning fog often burns off by eleven — that change IS the subject

Weston came here from 1929 to 1948, made his final negative here, and never ran out. The day's instruction is his: find something in the first hour and stay with it. Photograph one rock, one cypress, one pool — then come back to it at noon, and again at five, and put the three next to each other. That is the whole principle, and it is much harder than walking the loop once. Weston Beach is named for him and the eroded rock there is the obvious place to try it.

• back at the gate for opening · the light is different
• included · same entry

The best argument for the second night: the same rock in different weather, one day apart. If the fog is in, that is not a failure — it is the other half of the pair.

• Monterey Supercharger · 1410 Del Monte Center · 14 stalls, 250 kW · ~5 mi from the reserve
• arriving on about 40% · 🔴 to 90%, ~25 min
• 🔴 330 miles home is three charges, not one

Five miles from the gate and the last easy charge before the road turns inland. Ninety percent is exactly what the 115 miles to Paso Robles need, with the climb up the Salinas Valley counted.

• Highway 1 → the 101 via Salinas · ~115 mi, climbing ~600 ft
• inland via Salinas is faster than the coast road
• leave by nine or it is dark before Ventura

The first third of the way back. The 101 through Salinas and up the valley is dull and quick, which after two days of looking is the correct kind of road. King City (600 Canal St, 16 stalls) sits halfway if the traffic or the wind has been unkind.

• Paso Robles, CA – Riverside Avenue Supercharger · The Granary Shops, 1111 Riverside Ave · 8 stalls, 250 kW
• arriving on about 17% · 🔴 to 100%, not 90% — the 101 by Gaviota is ~130 mi to Santa Barbara
• lunch here rather than at a table later · Atascadero, 16 stalls, is 10 min south if it is full

Eat while it charges. This is the natural break in a six-hour drive, and the one stop on the way home that has to go all the way to full.

• the 101 south · ~130 mi by Gaviota
• the coast reappears at Gaviota

The middle third, and the one where the road becomes the ocean again for the last forty miles of it.

• Santa Barbara, CA – Anacapa Street · 12 stalls, 250 kW — the same stall as Day 1
• arriving on about 20% · 🔴 to 90%, ~35 min, for the last 90 miles — they climb ~2,700 ft in all
• 🔴 do not skip it to save the time; Ventura traffic eats range

Half an hour on the same stall the trip started at, which is a tidy way to end it. Ninety percent gets you home on about a fifth; seventy, priced on the climbs over the Conejo and the 405, would not clear the floor.

• the 101 south · ~90 mi
• Ventura to the basin is the slow part, whatever time it is

The last stretch, with the water on the right until Oxnard and then the long inland run in.