The Best Coast: A Road Trip Atlas - by Chandler O'Leary (Paperback)

About the Book

"The Work shall be a hybrid travel guide, atlas and illustrated history of the West Coast through the lens of three historic West Coast highways (focusing on the coastal route via 101 & 1) and with a bonus inland route up 99, connecting the traveler to major cities such as SEA, PDX, Palm Springs, and other attractions)"--

Book Synopsis

Take the ultimate West Coast road trip this summer with The Best Coast--a full-color illustrated travel guide to all the must-visit roadside attractions, beloved landmarks, hidden histories, and offbeat delights on Washington, Oregon, and California's historic highways, include the Pacific Coast Highway!

From San Diego, California, all the way up to the Olympic Peninsula in Washington State, you'll find unusual facts, hidden history, epic Americana, and off-the-beaten-path adventures up and down the coast.

This Road Trip Atlas Includes:

Route Maps - the coastal route via historic Highways 101 and 1 (the PCH) and an inland route up Highway 99
City Guides - San Diego, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Sacramento, Portland, and Seattle
30+ Itineraries and Side Trips - Catalina Island, Joshua Tree National Park, Sequoia and Yosemite National Parks, wine country, Crater Lake National Park, the Columbia River Gorge, Mount Rainier National Park, the San Juan Islands, and Vancouver, BC.
Travel Tips - safety, rules of the road, wise planning, and packing lists (for the traveler and for the car)
Wildlife Checklists
Index of places, parks and attractions
Resources - navigational aids, travel information, passes and permits, books, websites and films

Hit the road with this one-of-a-kind road trip travel guide through California, Oregon, and Washington that tells the story of the diversity and depth that created the West Coast we know and love today!

Review Quotes

An American Booksellers Association Indie Travel Bestseller

Praise for The Best Coast

"The Best Coast, Chandler O'Leary's illustrated road trip atlas spanning San Diego, Calif., and Washington State, taps into a desire among vacationers to see America as it was before chain restaurants and frequent-flyer mileage homogenized and shrunk the landscape."
--Publishers Weekly

"O'Leary's guide offers the best of both worlds by taking you off the beaten path without missing out on any bucket-list attractions."
--Seattle Times

"[Chandler] O'Leary's bright, delightful watercolors depict worthwhile stops and sights, from the mission architecture of San Diego to the parks of Vancouver, British Columbia. The book is also packed with the kind of dad-approved roadside history (did you know there are wild zebras in California?) that makes for memorable meandering."
--Seattle magazine

"All the beauty of a west coast road trip, condensed in a beautiful, yet practical book. The Best Coast: A Road Trip Atlas is perfect for those new to the West, and a wonderful supplement for the natives who haven't quite been everywhere yet. Handy tips, stunning locations and a number of side trips just in case you decide to do some wandering."
--Powells.com

"In The Best Coast, readers travel with O'Leary from San Diego to her current home state of Washington and back again. In between beautiful, hand-painted illustrations are portraits of roadside attractions, hidden histories, and historic highway guides."
--Roadtrippers magazine

"Not just an indispensable guide to the West Coast, this is a beautiful, one-of-a-kind love letter to some of my favorite places in the world."
--Geraldine DeRuiter, founder of Everywhereist.com

Praise for Chandler O'Leary and DrawnTheRoadAgain.com:

"Nobody is clear on the exact ratio of picture-to-words worthiness--some estimates have it as high as 1:1000--but it's hard to argue that your average travel writer could capture the essence of a place as well as Chandler O'Leary does with her . . . watercolor artwork."
--Fast Company

"O'Leary has a unique perspective on the sense of discovery in the journey as well as the destination."
--Atlas Obscura

About the Author

CHANDLER O'LEARY is an illustrator and lettering artist, and a graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design. She is the co-author of Dead Feminists: Historic Heroines in Living Color and the author of an illustrated travel blog called Drawn the Road Again. She lives in Tacoma, Washington, and spends every spare moment traveling America's winding back roads, sketchbook in hand.