Ready to hit the road? California has plenty of options for a quick day-trip or extended stay. We’ve got your planning covered for the beach, desert, and mountains with different itineraries to choose from. All you need to do is pick a destination, pack your bags, and go!

CENTRAL COAST

It’s about time. Time to explore the four regions of Monterey Bay, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, and Ventura. Each region delivers a memorable road trip along highways 1 and 101. Take the time. If you take the time, it will give you all the time you need. And it’s worth every second, whether you’re traveling northbound from Los Angeles or southbound from San Francisco.

NORTHBOUND FROM LOS ANGELES // SOUTHBOUND FROM SAN FRANCISCO

The Laguna Beach coastline.

LAGUNA BEACH

MORNING: Start at a lively café, followed by some beachfront yoga or a hike in 20,000 acres of wilderness. Or, climb to the top of the world and take in 360-degree views of the city.

AFTERNOON: Immerse yourself in a summer art festival, then enjoy the stunning beaches and coves—for paddleboarding, kayaking, tide pools, surfing, or just sunning. For a twilight tee time, Ben Brown’s golf course and country club offers a private game.

DINNER: With more than 100 restaurants dotting seven miles of coastline, there’s an option for everyone. For example, Las Brisas is an iconic culinary experience with sweeping coastline views.

EVENING: Head to the Pageant of the Masters to watch outdoor art come to life under the stars. Late-night drinks and live music at Skyloft downtown are the perfect cap to your day in paradise.

VisitLagunaBeach.com

DANA POINT

MORNING: Start your day with a game at Monarch Beach Golf Links’ 18-hole beachside course.

AFTERNOON: A whale-watching tour is a must in the Whale and Dolphin Watching Capital of the World.

EVENING: Unwind looking over the ocean while doing sunset yoga with iHeartYoga.

DINNER: Get a taste of celebrity chef John Tesar’s fresh coastal seafood at Outer Reef.

Sailboats at Marina del Rey.

MARINA DEL REY

Just four miles from LAX, Marina del Rey is Los Angeles’ urban waterfront, offering wide-open spaces, waterfront dining, recreation, and luxe coastal hotels.

MORNING: Have fun on the water, with chartered sailing excursions, paddleboarding, kayaking, fishing, parasailing, and more.

AFTERNOON: Hop on a beach cruiser and follow the 22-mile bike path that wraps around the marina and LA’s beaches.

EVENING: Unwind at any of the marina’s seven waterfront hotels, all of which offer sparkling harbor views.

DINNER: Beachside, Brizo, Cast & Plow, Tony P’s Dockside Grill, and SALT boast some of the best patio and terrace views in town.

VisitMDR.com

MAMMOTH

Kayaking at Mammoth Mountain

The Mammoth Adventure Center is your portal to family fun and outdoor activities. With a world-class bike park, scenic gondola rides, and the Via Ferrata guided climbing experience, there’s fun for everyone.

DAY 1: Explore the ropes course, climbing wall, junior zip line, bungee trampoline, and more! End the day with a sunset paddle.

DAY 2: Cruise the bike park and hop on the chair lift or load the gondola to explore over 80 miles of single-track, or rent an e-bike!

MammothMountain.com/discover/summer-getaway

TUOLUMNE COUNTY

Northern California’s Tuolumne County is a road trip destination that is worth every mile.

MORNING: Wake up in the High Sierra at McCaffrey House Bed and Breakfast.

AFTERNOON: Get ready for a day of Yosemite explorations and take a hike at the Tuolumne Grove of Giant Sequoias.

EVENING: Wander through the historic gold-country town of Sonora.

DINNER: Grab a local bite at the Diamondback Grill.

Dining at Miramonte.

MIRAMONTE

Enjoy a more transformative getaway just outside Palm Springs at the Miramonte Resort & Spa in Indian Wells.

MORNING: Wake up to the stunning views of the Santa Rosa Mountains and tee off at Indian Wells Golf Resort.

AFTERNOON: Relax by the saltwater pool and find your bliss at the award-winning WELL Spa, which offers massages, facials and more.

EVENING: Enjoy delicious bites and craft cocktails (pictured above!) around a fire pit on the olive grove patio.

MiramonteResort.com

The post Our Favorite Road Trips in California appeared first on San Diego Magazine.

Omega Mart

Kate Russell

Las Vegas is arguably the last destination most people think about when thinking of eco-friendly vacations. I watched Teslas zoom by while I passed the solar fields just outside the Strip on an uncomfortably hot spring day and it made me think: Sure, I offset my road trip’s carbon by donating to an organization that plants trees along my planned route, but that seemed like a Band-Aid. I had hoped for this trip to use regenerative travel practices, a growing traveling philosophy that dictates one shouldn’t only leave a place as they found it, but also seek to make it better. With that in mind, I set out on a quest to do more good than harm in Sin, eh… Sinless City.

See

I start my venture with using the zero-emissions monorail on the Strip, which removes 2.1 million vehicles a year from the clogged roadway. Inside the just-off-the-Strip Area 51 is the family-friendly art experience Meow Wolf–the only certified B-Corporation (a certification program for environmental/social performance) in the themed entertainment industry.

The collective’s brand-new permanent installation, “Omega Mart,” is a tripped-out convenience store offering some food for thought on how we live now. Part of the entrance fee goes to support local community organizations. In addition, Meow Wolf partners with local artists to create public installations, like Luis Varela Rico’s e-waste sculpture at Goodwill of Southern Nevada.

Arcadia Earth

Leong Sim

Another artsy experience is Arcadia Earth, the first immersive environmental art exhibit to explore our natural world’s challenges. Using large-scale installations built from upcycled materials, plus augmented and virtual reality, Arcadia Earth presents climate education in a fun way. To offset their emissions, they partnered with Sea Trees, an ocean reforestation nonprofit, to help regenerate kelp forests in California.

Relax

Locating a truly green hotel can be a challenge in Las Vegas, but some properties are trying harder than others to reduce their environmental footprints. For example, a large portion of the electricity needed to power slots at MGM Resorts Aria and Vdara and pool pumping at the Wynn Las Vegas, are powered by solar fields like the one I’d seen driving in. Still, few Vegas resorts were making headway in their dependence on fossil fuels. A good tip is to look into a resort’s water reuse practices and use that as a guideline.

Wynn Las Vegas

Barbara Kraft

Eat

While hunting for locally sourced cuisine, one friend laughed and said to me, “There are no farms in Vegas.” He was wrong. Enter the Summerlin neighborhood’s Honey Salt, Vegas’ only authentic farm-to-table restaurant (so far).

From the designing minds of Elizabeth Blau and Chef Kim Canteenwalla, the former of which is often credited for making Vegas a culinary destination in the first place, the sleek and stylish Honey Salt sources much of its veggie sides for its new summer seafood boil from Desert Blooms Farm in nearby Tecopa. Rumor has it that a carbon-neutral brewery, Brewdog, is also in the works for future visitors.

Do

Friends told me to get off the Strip to find inspiration and maybe make an impact. Spring Preserve’s Origen Museum educates community members and eco-travelers about the intense process of building sustainably in the interactive (and air-conditioned) LEED-certified museum. The property’s four trails, first traversed by the Paiute Indians, wind around the complex and ribbon into a cottonwood grove and past natural springs threaded with reeds. There, native tortoises baked in the sun, offering an unexpected lesson on how slowness helps a body adapt to oppressive heat.

I took a day kayak trip from the base of the Hoover Dam, up the Colorado River, to a natural hot spring and the Emerald Cave with Evolution Expeditions. Throughout the journey, I learned about conservation efforts and the west’s water crisis (40 million people rely on water from Lake Mead). Visitors can paddle along the rushing river, past waterfalls, bighorn sheep, and bald eagles, stopping to traverse slot canyons.

While meandering along a river so strong it carved canyons, it becomes clear to me that Vegas is evolving, perhaps not as quickly as other cities, but it’s trying. And spending our tourism dollars wisely can help support that.

The post Vida Las Vegas: Sustainability in Sin City appeared first on San Diego Magazine.