We will be arriving at SFO on 5/21 at noon and departing on the redeye on 5/28. We are flexible and want to spend 2/3 of our stay in the city and 1/3 in wine country, Monterrey(1 afternoon maybe?) and to see the redwoods or Hearst Castle. We have visited the Biltimore Estate in NC. Are there any hot springs that are worthwhile? I dont want to get a car while we are in the city due to high parking fees. Will try and use priceline for the rooms, however dont want to stay in the city if/when the hotels have high occupancy. Ive been to wine country in South Africa, so would want a less pretentious wine area than what Im reading about Napa for the wife and will probably buy wine from wine stores. Should we skip Monterrey and go north to the redwoods/Sonoma area? We are both in our early 40's and in pretty good shape. I drive a big brown truck and we both work out a bit. This is a great forum. Any help would be apprieciated.(this msg was edited from the San Francisco section)

Welcome to FlyerTalk.

It take about two hours each way to travel by car between San Francisco and Monterey so I would plan on more time than one afternoon. There is a lot to see and do down there so you might consider spending a night or two in Monterey or Carmel.

Napa and Sonoma are both lovely and are easy day trips from San Francisco. Again, there's also plenty to do there to spend a few days. Some wineries may be pretentious; others aren't. There are far more that aren't.

Yes, I would definitely avoid driving in San Francisco. It's not the easiest place to drive or to find parking. If you wanted to go to Monterey though, I'd rent a car for that.

There are spring-fed spas all over the Napa Valley area. There are a lot of options there. The only ones I don't much care for are the sulfur springs spas - yuck.

This is all pretty general information. As you come up with more specific questions, I'm sure I and others will be happy to help.

If you choose to go south to Hearst Castle you'll find the Paso Robles wine region to be more casual and a "less pretentious wine area". I find it more like Napa was in the old days, 20 years or so ago. Not uncommon in Paso Robles to have the tasting room staffed by the winemaker.
http://www.pasowine.com/
http://www.faroutwineries.com
A few travel articles about the area.
http://www.coastmagazine.com/travel_pasorobles.html
http://www.viamagazine.com/weekenders/paso_robles03.asp
http://www.forbes.com/global/2003/0120/056.html

The area also has several developed hot springs. Natural sulfur springs but we've enjoyed them. The Paso Robles Inn and Sycamore Springs both have hotel rooms with the spring water piped to private soaking tubs. Paso Robles Hot Springs is only soaking tubs connected to a day spa.
http://www.sycamoresprings.com
http://www.pasoroblesinn.com
http://www.pasohotsprings.com

If you make it to the Paso Robles area: About 25 mi. east (Cholame) is the James Dean Memorial Site. This is the area in which Dean's fatal auto accident occurred:

http://www.roadsideamerica.com/tips/...actionNo==2791

http://www.sandylydon.com/html/pasoclass.html

here's a totally different idea. drive across golden gate bridge to marin, and off hwy 1 to point reyes national seashore. we were there last weekend. it is always spectacular. lots of hikes, easy to hard. the light house is amazing. we saw gray whales migrating. the wildflowers are the most spectacular i've ever seen up there, probably due to the greater than normal rainfall. fabulous. it can be a day trip from the city or you could easily drive over to napa valley.

Sonoma is definitely more laid-back than Napa. Healdsburg is a great home base - it's where the Russian River Valley, Alexander Valley, and Dry Creek Valley all meet. It's a cute town and there are some decent restaurants too.

To try to accomplish Monterey and Hearst Castle in one afternoon is a little too much. I would suggest Monterey and Carmel (17 Mile Drive on the Monterey Penisula is very nice.)

Enjoy!

Just a question - I'm a 4th generation Californian & I've never heard it called 'Cali,' except by non-residents. Is this common? Is it like calling San Francisco 'Frisco?' Just curious...

I know what you mean, my family got to California in 1850 (I know a little late). I've been seeing this "Cali" thing for a couple of years now. Seems to be a new trendy thing.

Personally I'm not fond of it. But I think it's too late to stop. Avis ran an ad last year that said "With Avis, driving the coast in Cali gets you a free upgrade"

I've never heard California referred to as Cali before this thread, but then I didn't realize it was Cah-lee-fawn-ya until fairly recently. I originally found this thread by looking at "new posts" and thought it was going to be about a trip to Colombia.

Colombia was exactly what popped into my mind when I saw the title.

Same here (I'm also a 4th generation Californian).

I hear the "Cali' term a lot on sports talk shows - I wonder if someone like Jim Rome or one of the announcers on ESPN popularized it?

It seems to be from rap and hip-hop. There are songs with titles like "I Love Cali in the Summer Time!" and "Cali To NY".

Thanks for the input. So far, we have decided to go to a fireworks show the 1st nite http://www.kfog.com/Events/kaboom/2005/. We are staying in the financial district. 2nd day, get up, hire a car, check out(we only got the room for a nite)and drive out to the Oakdale Chocolate Festival http://www.chocolatefestival.org/pdf...brochure05.pdf. We wanted to go on the Sierra Railroad that offered a return trip on a river raft, but we will miss the chocolate fest if we do that. That RR has festival 1 hour train rides with tastings for $16.
Being Sunday nite in Oakdale, we are wide open until Friday nite when we plan to go on the Napa Valley wine train for a murder mystery dinner train.
We will probably return to SF Sunday nite after chocolate, return the car and just walkabout or use public trans. the next couple days then head up to Healdsburg wine country Thursday morning. We will probably stay in that area close to the time our redeye leaves Saturday nite.
Are there any similar trains in Sonoma or should we stick with the one in Napa?
If I pick up a rental car in town and return it to the airport, is there an extra charge?
We really dont want to be driving 1 plus hours every day. Made that mistake last year in Canada and we really got wore down.
Living in Central Florida, we hope these listings are not "tourist traps" that are everywhere here.
Any feedback on the different trains, events or any hot tips welcomed!

The Napa Wine Train is definitely for tourists, but a lot of people seem to like them, and if you enjoy murder mysteries, this might be a good choice. Personally, I'm not a fan - you can get better food for the same money or less, and you get a better view by driving up the valley on a more rural road (Silverado Trail) than the one the trail parallels.