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My wife and I just spent a very nice Memorial Day weekend at Monterey, California, which included a visit to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Monterey is only about a 3.5 hour drive from Sacramento and about an hour drive south of San Francisco. If you ever get a chance to visit Monterey and the Monterey Bay Aquarium here in California, especially on a sunny day, you definitely won't regret it.

 

gonna be out there in the next couple of weeks - looks fab - how is the weather???

 

Summers tend to be foggy on the Pacific Coast.....but occasionally the sun will come out. Have fun but bring a warm coat!

 

Thanks for the tip! - is it warmer inland?

 

In the summer, yes. For example, it is not unusual, during the summer, to have San Francisco have a high temperature of only 70 degrees F (with a 20 mph wind) with Sacramento, 80 miles inland from the Pacific, have a high temperature of 105 degrees F. This is caused by the coast being cooled by the dense marine air layer that will produce fog that is sucked in from the ocean and cools the coastal areas (including San Francisco and Monterey) whereas Sacramento, in the heart of the Great Central Valley of California, is, in most areas, geographically sheltered from the cooler ocean air by the Coastal Range of mountains along much of the western coast of California. These conditions make for excellent windy conditions for windsurfing in the areas where there are breaks in the Coastal Range. The attached photo is from Rio Vista, where some of the best windsurfing in the world exists. In this location on the Sacramento River in a region called the Sacramento River Delta, the hot valley "sucks" (hot air rises from the heating valley floor in the summer) the cooler and more dense ocean air, called the "Marine Layer", through the Carquinez Straits (i.e. the San Francisco Bay "blows" and the Central Valley "sucks"). Rio Vista is where I frequently sailed when I was a windsurfing boardhead in my younger days.

Mark Twain once was quoted as saying that the coldest winter he ever spent was a summer in San Francisco. This can also apply to Monterey where very similar weather conditions exist as in San Francisco. Bring warm clothes for San Francisco and Monterey and short sleeved shirts and shorts and lots of sunscreen for Sacramento if you are visiting in June, July, August or September.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_of_California

 

Thank you very much Kevin

 

Thanks for triggering off some memories Kevin. On a drive from L.A to San Francisco I stayed in the Carmel/Monterey region. Beautiful area. Wish I could live there (would the U.S have an Aussie??).

Was thinking about going back to the region to do the Big Sur Marathon, which I here is quite a picturesque & eventful Marathon to do... maybe next year.