Best places to stopover between Seattle and San Francisco

We are planning to drive from Seattle to San Francisco and then LA with possible itinerary to visit: Crater Lake, Mount Rainier, Mount St. Helens National Park, Washington State; Red Wood Forest, Oregon State; the scenic Highway 1 all the way to LA. Please advise where are the best places to stopover for each of the 3 nights where drive time would be comfortable (max 5 hours?) and yet we could see the above at a reasonable pace?

Thank you!

Best places to stopover between Seattle and San Francisco

A five hour drive from Seattle, without detouring to see Mt. St. Helens, will get you to Eugene. A five-hour drive from Eugene, without any detouring to Crater Lake, will get you to, perhaps, Redding on I-5. A five-hour drive from Redding will get you to the SF Bay Area. And the next 5-6 hour drive will get you into LA via major interstate highways.

Forget Hwy 1 in California. That%26#39;s a full day in itself and not really ';comfortable driving.';

Quite frankly, I don%26#39;t think you appreciate the distances involved in traveling the west coast states. To do what you want, with only three nights of stopovers, would mean driving hard all day and not stopping or detouring to see anything. Just about every place you mentioned would involve several hours of detouring off the main I-5 route.

Best places to stopover between Seattle and San Francisco

What would you suggest with detouring? Of course we want to see the sights, otherwise we%26#39;d just fly from Seattle to LA....We have 5 days between the two cities. If need be, we will fly fr Seattle to San francisco,but I think that would mean we will overshoot and miss some places?

Well, you will surely get a variety of opinions from the posters on this forum, but the key thing to consider would be your particular interests. You%26#39;ll have to pick and choose since you won%26#39;t be able to do it all.

Figure Mt. St. Helens will take about 4 hours (including an hour%26#39;s drive each way between the must visit Johnston Observatory and the main I-5 highway).

It%26#39;s about 2 hours from Portland to the coast and, although the Oregon coast is magnificent and a favorite of visitors to the state, it will take much longer to drive down the coast than down I-5. I don%26#39;t remember when you said you%26#39;d be visiting. The timing could affect when and where you will be able to go (snow in the mountains, for example). If the weather is clear, seeing Mt. Rainier from the highway will suffice.

Do you want to spend any time in Seattle, Portland, San Francisco or any other city?

The Mt. Hood loop takes about a half-day, including lunch at Timberline Lodge atop the volcano. But you could just do some of the Columbia Gorge in a few hours...including Multnomah Falls.

To see Crater Lake, you%26#39;d have to cross the state from the coast (if, indeed, you go to the coast) and cross I-5 and go another hour to hour and a half one-way to the south entrance.

Now, keep in mind, we haven%26#39;t yet touched California.

The redwoods are on the northern California coast and you would probably want to go through them to get to San Francisco.

What I%26#39;ve outlined so far would be a two-week trip and we haven%26#39;t gotten below San Francisco yet.

So, you%26#39;ll have to do a lot more research and rethink your priorities. What I%26#39;d do may not be what you will want to do. Same goes for some others on the forum who have vested interests in their priorities. We%26#39;ll be able to help you more when we find out what you think is vital to make your trip a success.

Ah, too many miles to cover in three days with only 5 hours driving each day!

Mt St Helens does not open until mid-May.

Okay, you could leave Seattle and drive to Mt St Helens (visiting will take 3 hours minimum), then overnight in Portland area. That would be Day 1.

Day 2, drive south on I-5 freeway to Grants Pass - this will be a full day about 5-6 hours on the freeway. Scenery is nice, but not spectacular.

Day 3 would be to drive Hwy 199 to Crescent City, California, then south on Hwy 101 to about Garberville. You could drive the Avenue of the Giants southbound. Overnight around Garberville - this day includes about 5-6 hours driving.

Day 4 drive to San Francisco, about 4 hours.

You do not have time to drive to Crater Lake. You will go right through the redwoods south of Crescent City, CA, and then more along the Avenue of the Giants.

Between San Francisco and Los Angeles you can drive Highway 1 and stop overnight around Cambria or Pismo Beach, but you cannot drive it all in one day.

Hope that gives you a better idea of the distances :-)