They accomplished all of L.A. Times’ 101 Best California Experiences

By December of 2023, Paul Preston realized that his girlfriend Susan Huckle was an enormous fan of highway journeys and lists. So for Christmas, he gave her L.A. Times’ ”101 Best California Experiences” zine, a traveler’s bucket record highlighting my prime locations all through my 4 many years of touring the state.

The present, I’m delighted to listen to, was successful.

Preston and Huckle went by way of it and checked off places they’d seen already. Then they hit the highway.

And now, after two and a half years of roaming the state between work assignments, they’re again to report that they’ve lined all 101 places on that record. Though the 2 have additionally traveled past state traces, the search to cowl California “totally informed our lives for the last two or three years,” mentioned Huckle, who despatched me a observe of thanks after ticking the final field.

After the observe arrived, I used to be wanting to name them and be taught extra. I caught the couple, after all, in the course of a day journey.

Susan Huckle and Paul Preston got down to go to each spot on the L.A. Times’ 2023 record of “101 Best California Experiences.” Along the best way, they received married in Yosemite Valley.

(Nick Wuthrich)

“We’re out exploring,” Preston mentioned. “So you’re getting what we’re about.”

They’re additionally now married. That occurred final July in Yosemite Valley, which, sure, was on the record.

Huckle, 41, an actress, a number on “L.A. This Week” on Channel 35, a Universal Studios performer and an author, grew up in Santa Maria on California’s Central Coast.

Preston, 56, can also be an actor. He leads movie location tours and hosts podcasts, film trivia nights and particular occasions. He grew up and went to school on the East Coast, so he had fewer California miles beneath his belt when the couple met in 2020.

Their California 101 travels started in early 2024 with a visit to Paso Robles, the place they noticed the inexperienced slopes alongside Highway 46, Morro Rock and the elephant seals at Piedras Blancas close to Hearst Castle.

“And then,” Preston mentioned, “we just kept going.”

Some of their most satisfying stops, the 2 agreed, had been locations they hadn’t heard of, resembling Orange Works within the Central Valley city of Strathmore and Angel Island State Park, typically often called the Ellis Island of the West. Huckle known as Angel Island “a marriage of natural beauty with great, powerful, historic information.”

By early this yr, there have been only some locations left to examine.

In April, they did the Indian Canyons and Sunnylands property close to Palm Springs, the Integratron close to Joshua Tree and the Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art & Culture in Riverside. In June, they rafted the South Fork of the American River, together with stops in Old Sacramento and, final of all, Columbia State Historic Park. Then they made their very own favorites lists.

Susan Huckle’s top 10:

Yosemite Valley
Badwater Basin
Mammoth Mountain
Angel Island State Park
Cheech Marin Center
Joshua Tree National Park
American River South Fork
The Marshall Store on Tomales Bay
Santa Cruz Island
Sunnylands

Paul Preston’s prime 10:

Yosemite Valley
Hollywood Bowl
Griffith Observatory
Catalina
Mammoth Mountain
American River South Fork
Erick Schats’ Bakery in Bishop
Huntington Library and Gardens
Palm Springs Aerial Tramway
Balboa Park, San Diego

Now that they’ve seen a lot of the state, I had questions. For one, which spots not on the record would they’ve included?

Alcatraz, they agreed. Also, as an admirer of redwoods, Preston favored Calaveras Big Trees State Park. As an avid bicycle owner, Huckle favored the 22-mile Marvin Braude Bike Trail from Torrance to Pacific Palisades.

And was something on the record a disappointment?

“The Carmel Mission,” Huckle mentioned rapidly. “It’s beautiful and the missions are an important part of California history.” But she mentioned the mission’s account of its personal historical past appeared “whitewashed,” saying little concerning the Native loss and trauma that historians are more and more recognizing in accounts of the missions.

Said Huckle: “I was like, ‘C’mon guys, nobody really thinks this any more, right?’”

Now that they’re completed with the Times’ “101 Best California Experiences,” what what’s going to form their subsequent journeys?

They have a listing for that. Huckle picked up an L.A. information, Danny Jensen’s “Secret Los Angeles,” and the couple plans to begin the place the e-book does, with the Triforium, a many-colored sculpture that went up exterior City Hall in 1975 (and as soon as featured music).

After that? Maybe the Faces of Elysian Valley, a site visitors circle sculpture that Huckle mentioned “looks like Easter Island in the middle of Cypress Park.”

That will go away solely about 138 extra locations within the e-book to cowl.

If anyone can do it, it’s these two.