I’m Stephanie, a wedding + lifestyle photographer based in Colorado Springs, Colorado and Warrenton, Virginia. Whether I’m by the mountains of Colorado or Virginia, my soul feels at home, surrounded by rural living and the raw beauty of nature. I genuinely love what I do, and feel so passionate to share the enthusiasm and joy of these celebrations with you!

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February 20, 2014

California Road Trip

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I have SO much to share with you about my 8-day road trip around California! The jet lag got the best of me today since I just got back yesterday, but I’m excited to get back into the daily grind. Check out all four blog posts about my California road trip here:

LA/Yosemite
San Francisco/Sonoma
Route 1/Carmel/Monterey
The Hearst Castle

I hope you can use these blog posts as a resource to plan your future road trip plan on the west coast. I’m looking forward to more travels in the near future and sharing my experiences (good/bad) with you. 🙂 

Things I would’ve done differently

*Spend more time in Yosemite
* Instead of going from San Francisco to Sonoma to Santa Cruz in one day, I would suggest making a night in Sonoma. so you get to wine taste in not just one place. It would have been nice to experience more than just one winery for the full experience of Sonoma … even the Napa Valley area!
* More time in San Francisco. I would love to check out Alcatraz in the future!
* Instead of staying in Santa Cruz, I would suggest staying in Monterey or Carmel!
* Instead of staying in Cambria, I would suggest staying in Santa Barbara!
* LA is the worst city for traffic. Even more horrid than Washington DC. HAHA!
* If you plan to take a longer trip, I highly recommend skipping LA as the final destination and going south to visit Laguna Beach, San Diego, Orange County, etc. …

The Overview

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Day 1: Late night arrival in LA.

Day 2: Adventured around LA, specifically in Venice and Santa Monica.
Left LA before rush hour and arrived in Yosemite late at night.

Day 3: Spent the day hiking and driving through the Vally of Yosemite.
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Day 4: San Francisco before the true rush hour started and walked by foot around the city.

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Day 5: Wine tasted in Sonoma and started the Route 1 drive!

Day 6: Ventured the “17 mile drive”

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Day 7: Hearst Castle

Day 8: Red eye flight back to Virginia

I’m so grateful I had the opportunity to explore around and do a big California road trip!!!

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