The San Francisco call., 1913-08-24
BUICK MACHINE
BLAZES NEW WAY
To SANTA CRUZ
es
claud MCGEE Pilots Party
Through Scenic Country
TO Beach City to Boost
Portola Festival
CASA DEL REY PLAYS
HOST FOR THE PARTY
, Pescadero-Alpine Road Cir
cles Through Valleys and
Along Ocean Crests

among the motorists who visited
Santa Cruz to take advantage of the
weekend entertainment offered by the
Casa Del Rey management last week
was Claud MeGee of the Howard Au-
tomobile company. Pacific coast dis
tributers of Buick and National cars.
McGee was accompanied by four
friends and made the round trip of 200
miles with his 80 horsepower Buick.
The party did not follow either of
the regular Santa Cruz roads on the
: down trip and are enthusiastic over
3 the scenic beauties of the route fol-
! lowed. In speaking of the trip McGee
I said:
Il have been to Santa Cruz a number
OF times over both the Los Gatos- So
quel road and the Gilroy- -Watsonville
route and also have made a number of
trips down the coast as far as Pesca-
dero. The 35 mile gap between Pesca-
dero and Santa Cruz was new. how
ever, and as I have never been able to
get any reliable data on this stretch
OF road we decided to include it in our
trip last Sunday.
I'VE left San Francisco at 1880 a. m.
via Nineteenth avenue and the bouIe-
ward to Colma; the streetcar line was
followed from here on to the Baden
crossing and a short distance beyond
the first of the state highway was en-
countered. This excellent piece of
road continued to the city limits of
San Mateo, where we encountered very
rough going. In the heart of San Ma
teo we turned to the right on the Half
Moon Bay road, which is IN fine condi-
tion, and followed it past the Spring
Valley lakes and on to Byrnes' store,
where we turned south to Woodside,
thence on to La Honda via the Preston
the road forks. The right hand fork
follows down the canyon to San Gre
gorio, while the left hand one, which
is known as the Alpine road, runs over
the mountains to the head waters of
Pescadero creek, which it follows TO
the town of Pescadero. We took the
latter and at Pescadero turned south
and followed near the ocean into Santa
Cruz, where we arrived at 1:20.
The return trip was made via So
quel, Los Gatos, Santa Clara and
thence up the state highway to San
francisco. We left Santa Cruz at $50
and were in San Francisco at 10
o'clock The Buick and its Goodyear
tire equipment made their usual clean
score, as there was not the slightest
trouble of any nature encountered on
the entire trip.
THE route we followed on the trip
down is fairly well known TO motorists
road below La Honda. This road is
really the beginning of the best seen
cry. and while it is rather steep and
narrow in places and there are some
sharp turns encountered, the ordinary
car should have no trouble in negotiat-
ing It providing the same amount of
care is used that should be used on
any mountain road. There are sew
eraI short stretches that are rather
dusty, but the roadbed is fair for the
greater part of the way.
G'Be1ow Pescadero we encountered
some sand and there are several short,
sharp pitches. but nothing that caused
our Buick any trouble, and we were
able to average about 20 miles per hour
for the entire distance. This is rather
fast for comfort. however, and the
motorist who negotiates 1t at a 10 or
15 mile average will really enjoy this
part OF the trip, as the scenery is en-
ttrely different from that usually found
in California"