California

Few destinations summon as many daydreams as California, the breathtakingly gorgeous West Coast state famed throughout the last century for delivering la dolce vita, New World style. There’s a reason California is the birth place of the road trip: the rewards of getting around have never been more abundant and immediate. With characterful cities across the state, snow-capped mountains and granite peaks in the national parks of the interior, other-worldly desert landscapes to the southeast, dense and ancient forest along the cliff-hugging Pacific Coast Highway and rustic surf towns with swathes of sandy beaches fringing the coast, a California road trip promises scenic diversity along with iconic landmarks.