Cambria

Cambria is a small village a few miles south of San Simeon, split between a quiet main street inland and a run of rocky, driftwood-strewn beaches along Highway 1. It makes an easy base for Hearst Castle and the elephant seals, but the town's own coastline is the real draw: a boardwalk above the surf, low-tide pools full of life, and a big, protected ranch where the bluffs have been left wild.

Moonstone Beach runs along Moonstone Beach Drive, with a boardwalk on the bluff above it. It is a beach for walking and looking rather than swimming: driftwood, rocks just offshore and steady open-ocean surf. The boardwalk is part of Hearst San Simeon State Park, and leashed dogs are welcome on it.

Essential stops in and around Cambria:

• Moonstone Beach Boardwalk — the classic Cambria walk, with ocean views from the bluff above the beach.
• Leffingwell Landing — a rocky stretch of Hearst San Simeon State Park with tide pools at low tide (no dogs).
• Fiscalini Ranch Preserve — 430 acres of open coastal land in the middle of town, with an accessible bluff trail.
• William Randolph Hearst Memorial Beach — a calm cove and pier a short drive north in San Simeon.
• Piedras Blancas elephant seals — a free roadside viewing area farther north on Highway 1; see our San Simeon guide.

Cambria's tide pools are at their best on a low tide, and best of all on a minus tide. The rocks around Leffingwell Landing and the north end of Moonstone Beach hold mussels, barnacles and anemones. Walk carefully on the wet rock, leave everything where you find it, and keep an eye on the sets: this is open coast, and waves can wash across reefs that looked dry a minute earlier.

The nearest NOAA tide station is San Simeon, a few miles up the coast, which publishes predicted high and low tides. Check the low-tide times there before heading out, and plan to arrive on the rocks an hour or so before the low.