A short drive from my Mother's house towards the Pacific Ocean is the Palos Verdes Peninsula. This is one of the best road trips you can do in a few hours in the Southern California.
This was one of our favorite routes J.J. and I used to take when we were dating.
Those days we recall seeing large "castle-like" estates high on hilltops over looking the blue Pacific.
There were also lots of open fields and hiking trails which we could take from the top of the hill all the way down to the sandy beach.
One can follow the Palos Verdes scenic drive from Palos Verdes Estates to Rancho Palos Verdes and finish at San Pedro Harbor.
It took us only 23 miles to make the round-trip loop from my Mother's house.
For residents, we refer to the area as "PV". Palos Verdes actually includes Palos Verdes Hills, Palos Verdes Estates, Rancho Palos Verdes, Rolling Hills & Rolling Hills Estates.
These are affluent coastal cities. Some part of the drive is reminiscent of Amalfi Coast in Italy, other area the drive up to the Peak in Hong Kong and yet others are like the winding road from Hanauma Bay towards Sealife Park on Oahu, Hawaii.
Gated developments now dots once pastoral hillsides making us long for the good old days when the peninsula was not so crowded and land developer had not yet divided the land to build homes.
Aloha -- Cathi