The following four scenic drives around the San Francisco Bay Area make for excellent day trips.
Mount Diablo
Drive about 1 1/2 hours east of San Francisco for the scenic drive through Mount Diablo State Park to the top of Mount Diablo, in Contra Costa County. It is a curvy 11-mile drive if you enter through the North Gate Road Entrance on North Gate Road in Walnut Creek, and about a 15-mile drive if you enter through the South Gate Entrance on South Gate Road in Danville. There is a $10 entrance fee.The drive will take you past woodlands populated with oak trees, such as the interior live oak and the California black oak, and in the springtime, past vistas of wildflowers, including fields of California poppies.
