heed th e wise words of norse-aztec :)
 

There are airport charges in SFO that add between $50-100 per rental on a GOOD day - so [I] echo the advice to NOT rent at the airport. It has little to do w/ the drop charge at another location - it's just more expensive to rent from SFO.

Every car rental handles drop charges differently - IIRC hertz factors it into the price, Dollar and Budget add a charge that is spelled out separately.

Frreways and/or Tollways - we have both
 

That's the idea. Note that it took me three trips to get most of PCH from SFO to San Diego due to landslides and such.

If you do the Malibu stretch, you may want to try for reservations at the redone Getty Villa - http://www.getty.edu/visit/

Southbound from LA/Long Beach, the Seal Beach - Huntington beach stretch is nice. After that opinions may vary...

You'll do I-5 through Camp Pendleton, but when you get to Oceanside you should head back to the coast and old highway 101.

After Del Mar, you'll pass Torrey Pines golf course. I'm no golfer, but I gather tee tomes require more than money.

Take your time and plan your stops to be near the shore, not a freeway.

i'd say just do Hwy 1 south of big sur. It's a nice drive if you have a nice car and the sun is still up and your car mates are awake. After a while, it just gets to be more of the same and you may want to just hit the freeway and get to where you want to go.

Also, I'd say make sure you have a full tank in Monterey/Carmel. Not much on the PCH until you get past San Simeon. There was one station which was $3.50+ back in 2000. I can't imagine what it is now.

Also, you may want to limit yourself to just northern or southern cal depending on if you're interested in doing anything beyond spend a few hours in each place you go or if you want to relax. in SF, you could spend a week and still not see everything.

In San Diego, hit Sunset Cliffs around, well sunset, great views.

Fianlly, make sure to account for your itinerary about when you'll pass through big cities. You can easilly blow 3 hours on a 1 hour drive through LA if you hit the roads at the wrong time. Google traffic view will give you a real time look at things - check it during the times you'd plan to be there to get an idea of the slow downs.

Yes ditto to this! :-:

About the one-way car rental, it is often *much* cheaper renting LAX-SFO than SFO-LAX. In fact sometimes it is zero cost (no rental charge, never mind no drop-off charge). This is because most people do as you propose -- rent one-way southbound -- and cars accumulate in SoCal needing to be moved back north. Of course the southbound drive is on the ocean side of the road, fwiw.

There is a trick to how to book the French Laundry, but I'm not about to reveal it, except that you can figure it out for yourself if you think about how they do bookings. Still there are 1000 people vying for every seat there.

The cars build up in LAX probably just like they do in EYW...one-way scenery principle, no?

My recollection is that Enterprise does not charge an extra fee for one-way rentals within California, but that they only do one-way rentals from airport locations. My partner and I managed to get a free upgrade to a convertible at Enterprise (from mid-size) when we were going from LA to SF and decided to take the PCH up as a result. I would not recommend doing the PCH for such a long stretch. It is beautiful, but gets tiring, and for large chunks of it, you can't really change your mind and get back to a freeway. The recommendation to break off at SLO is a good one because I think you should go see Big Sur. I might have missed this in an earlier comment, but if not, Sierra Mar at Post Ranch Inn is highly recommended -- try to go during sunset.

I've managed to get reservations to French Laundry twice. If you get a couple people to call, you can generally do it, but yes, it has to be two months in advance, and it's easier on week nights. Since you've got a decent break, maybe plan for a week night. I too have heard good things about Cyrus, but haven't been. My favorite non-FL meal in Napa was Redd.

In the SD area, I love Coronado. This might be cheesy, but I also love the Wild Animal park.