USA Guide
California
Publicized and idealized all over the world, California has a formidable reputation as a paradise of sun, sand, and surf, added to fast-paced, glitzy cities, primeval old-growth forests, and vast stretches of deserts. Anlthough once the power base for taxpayer revolts and reactionary stalwarts such as Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon, California has also been the source of some of the country's most progressive movements.
California is much too large to be fully explored in a single trip – much will depend on what you're looking for. Los Angeles is far and away the biggest and most stimulating city: a maddening collection of freeways, beaches, suburbs, and extreme lifestyles. To the south, the more conservative metropolis of San Diego has broad, welcoming beaches and a renowned zoo, while further inland, the deserts, most notably Death Valley, make up a barren and inhospitable landscape of volcanic craters and salt pans that in summer becomes the hottest place on earth. Heading north, the central coast is a gorgeous run that takes in lively small towns such as Santa Barbara and Santa Cruz.
California's second city, San Francisco, is about as different from LA as it's possible to get: a European-styled jewel whose wooden Victorian houses and steep hills make it one of the world's most distinctive and appealing cities. To the east, excellent national parks include Yosemite, where waterfalls cascade into a sheer glacial valley, and Sequoia/Kings Canyon with its gigantic trees, as well as the ghost towns of the Gold Country. North of San Francisco the countryside becomes wilder, wetter, and greener, peppered with volcanic tablelands and verdant mountains.
The climate in southern California features seemingly endless days of sunshine and warm, dry nights. Coastal mornings can be hazily overcast and in the Bay Area around San Francisco it can be chilly all year, and fog rolls in to spoil many a sunny day. Winter in northern California can bring rain for weeks on end. Most hiking trails in the mountains are blocked between October and June by the snow that keeps California's ski slopes among the busiest in the nation.
Highlights
1 San Diego Zoo About as humane and "natural" as a zoo can get, with a vast collection of rare species.
2 Mono Lake A strange and remote sight that's well worth the trip – prime bird-watching territory amid blue waters and gnarled tufa columns.
3 Joshua Tree National Park The eerily twisted "arms" of Joshua trees beckon visitors to explore this long-abandoned mining country.
4 Highway 1 A thrilling, circuitous drive along the US's West Coast, with pounding Pacific surf and dramatic cliffside vistas.
5 Yosemite National Park Giant sequoias, towering waterfalls, the sheer face of Half Dome – your eyes will hardly get a rest.
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