PCH+ Pacific Coast Highway Adventure Tour

Eight nights and around 1,600 miles from Bend in Oregon down the Pacific Coast Highway to the Nevada desert, on a mix of pavement and dirt. Riders bring their own bike or rent one.

Grants Pass comes first by way of the Cascade Lakes Highway, Windigo Pass and Crater Lake, which fills a collapsed volcano and is the deepest lake in the United States at just under 600 metres. Eureka follows through the redwood parks, where the Jedediah Smith, Del Norte Coast and Prairie Creek groves hold the tallest trees on earth, and Highway 1 begins.

Fort Bragg is next along the Avenue of the Giants, with the Chandelier drive-through tree and the King Range beyond, then San Francisco by way of the Mendocino forest, Bodega Bay and the Golden Gate.

Morro Bay follows through Monterey, Carmel, Big Sur and over the Bixby Bridge, with the elephant seal colony and Hearst Castle on the way. Lone Pine comes next by way of the Bitter Creek refuge, where California condors have been reintroduced after coming within a couple of dozen birds of extinction, with Sequoia National Park and Lake Isabella beyond, and Pahrump closes the route through Death Valley, with the Devil’s Golf Course, Badwater Basin and Zabriskie Point. Prices are quoted in US dollars. At this price it is the cheapest long trip in the operator’s range, and the coast road alone would justify it. Nine days from the Cascades to Death Valley also means the climate changes about four times, so the packing list is longer than the distance suggests.