Journeys›Photograph

Day Hike Along the Big Sur Coastline

·Monterey County, California·#hiking#california#spring#coastal#big sur
Steep, tree-covered coastal mountains meet the ocean under a cloudy sky.

Drove down to Big Sur for a day hike, starting high on the bluffs off Highway 1. Marine haze was still sitting on the water when we set out, and the coastline south dissolved into it — each headland a little fainter than the last, surf working at the rocks a long way below.

By the time the trail climbed out of the brush the haze had pulled back and the whole thing opened up: a bare-shouldered headland below us with paths cut across it, water going from white foam at the rocks to turquoise to a flat blue-grey out at the horizon. We stopped there a while on the grass. Hard to leave a spot like that, honestly.

Then the trail bent inland and the day changed completely — redwoods in the canyon, some of them burned black up their trunks and still standing, and through a gap in the trees a grey rock peak back in the Santa Lucias, no ocean in sight at all.

Steep, tree-covered hillsides descend to the blue ocean below a partly cloudy sky.A wide view of a blue ocean, a rocky coast, and a large, scrub-covered hill with a winding path.Vast blue ocean meeting a rugged, green-brown coastline with a winding dirt path up a hill.Green shrubs cover a steep hillside overlooking a rocky coastline and blue ocean under a cloudy sky.Foreground bushes overlook steep coastal hills leading to the ocean under a blue, cloudy sky.A person squats on a grassy hillside, overlooking a vast blue ocean and distant green hills under a cloudy sky.A person squats on a grassy hillside, looking out at the vast blue ocean and distant hills under a clear sky.Tall trees frame a green mountain range with a prominent rocky peak under a clear blue sky, with a leafy branch on the right.

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