An Off-Season Trip Down Highway 1

And still, we mush northward, but there are no snow drifts, only tidy shops along the highway in the town of Half Moon Bay. Rolling vegetable patches produce farm-fresh food, and the giant-pumpkin contest held every fall is a defining small-town Americana event. Year-round you can find good grog, light meals and more ocean-watching at the Ritz Carlton Half Moon Bay, which sits at the apex of two championship golf courses. This is a good place to admire hawks riding the thermals. If you want refreshment without leaving your car, pull over to the drive-through Caffino at the intersection of Highway 1 (also called Cabrillo Highway here) and San Mateo Road and sip an espresso.

San Francisco awaits. "The cool grey city of love,'' the poet George Sterling's description, typically loses its shroud of marine fog this time of year. Highway 1 blends into San Francisco's nondescript 19th Avenue when you cross the city line. For a better drive, motor west along John Daly Boulevard toward the water, then head north along Skyline Boulevard to the Great Highway.

On the Great Highway, you'll pass surfers shivering in their wet suits and hang-gliders taking off from Fort Funston to float over sand and water and the western end of Golden Gate Park. The Beach Chalet on the edge of the park offers good pub food and beer. Just up the road, perched on an outcropping of rock, is the Cliff House. A favorite of generations of San Franciscans, the Cliff House was renovated three years ago and now boasts several high-end spots to eat, a buzzy bar, an easy mix of locals and tourists and big servings of tradition. Mark Twain wrote about an earlier incarnation of the place.

The drive ends a few miles north, at the end of Lincoln Boulevard, which curves inland to meet the Golden Gate Bridge. It's fun to drive across the bridge, but you can walk, too, taking the east-side pedestrian promenade, or ride a bicycle on the west side to nearby Marin County. Walkers and cyclists don't have to pay, but motorists must cough up a $5 toll. Don't forget to look back; the city looks magnificent: romantic on its hills, modern with its jutting forest of high-rises and altogether splendid, framed by the blue waters of San Francisco Bay and the noble, burnt-orange girders of the Golden Gate Bridge.