# Pacific Coastal Highway

- Home
- Big Sur
- Pfeiffer Beach
- Elephant Seals
- Morro Bay

## Where Mountains Meet the Sea

Fog rolling off the sea, and up the mountainside. One moment you’re in brilliant sunshine. The next, you’re surrounded by fog—not a pea-souper like those that hung so thick and heavy over London in Dickens’ day or the first half of the twentieth century, but an ethereal mist. This is California Highway 1, which runs along the Pacific Coast. The section from Bixby Bridge in the North to Morro Bay in the South is spectacular. Although it’s a drive of only 105 miles (168 km), it’s worth taking slowly, stopping off frequently to take in the views and the fresh ocean air.

### Big Sur

Big Sur is the name given to the stretch of rugged and spectacular coastline from Carmel in the North to San Simeon in the South.

### Pfeiffer Beach

Pfeiffer Beach is a hidden gem in Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park. At end of an unsigned, narrow road, you come to a pristine beach surrounded by towering cliffs.

### Elephant Seals

Piedras Blancas beach just North of San Simeon is visited throughout the year by huge numbers of elephant seals, who come here to mate, give birth, and molt.

### Morro Bay

Morro Bay is a fishing community and resort on the California Central Coast halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco, dominated by Morro Rock, an extinct volcano.