17-Mile Drive is a scenic road through Pebble Beach and Pacific Grove on the Monterey Peninsula in California, much of which hugs the Pacific coastline and passes famous golf courses, mansions and scenic attractions, including the Lone Cypress, Bird Rock and the Del Monte Forest of Monterey Cypress trees.

The drive serves as the main road through the gated community of Pebble Beach. Inside this community, nonresidents have to pay a toll to use the road. Like the community, the majority of 17-Mile Drive is owned and operated by the Pebble Beach Corporation. The 17-Mile Drive is a -long scenic loop having five primary entrances - the main highway entrance at California State Route 1, and entrances in Carmel and Pacific Grove.

History

thumbnail|left|Original Hotel Del Monte, ca. 1885

In 1602 the Monterey Peninsula was mapped by Spanish explorers. By 1840 the area now called Pebble Beach was a rancho left to widow Carmen Garcia Barreto Maderiaga Maria by her husband. She sold the property for $500 in 1846. Ownership passed several times until 1862 when the property was purchased at auction for 12 cents for by David Jacks. At the time, the area was called "Stillwater Cove". Jacks leased the land to the "China Man Hop Company", a small village with a population of about 30 Chinese fishermen living in shacks built upon the rocky shoreline.

In 1880, Jacks sold the land to the Pacific Improvement Company (PIC), a consortium of The Big Four railroad barons: Charles Crocker, Mark Hopkins, Collis Huntington and Leland Stanford. By 1892, the PIC laid out a scenic road that they called the 17-Mile Drive, meandering along the beaches and among the forested areas between Monterey and Carmel. Within short order, the area became a tourist destination with the building of the Hotel Del Monte.

The hotel was the starting and finishing point for 17-Mile Drive, (originally called the 18-mile Drive by hotel operators). The drive was offered as a pleasure excursion to hotel guests, and was intended to attract wealthy buyers of large and scenic residential plots on PIC land. Sightseers riding horses or carriages along the 17-Mile Drive sometimes stopped at Pebble Beach to pick up agate and other stones polished smooth by the waves, and they commented on a few unusual tree formations known as the Witch Tree and the Ostrich Tree—the latter formed by two trees leaning on each other. At that time, the Chinese fishing community continued in existence despite mounting anti-Chinese sentiment among Monterey residents of European heritage. At roadside stands, Chinese-American girls sold shells and polished pebbles to tourists. In the 1900s, the automobile began replacing horses on 17-Mile Drive, and by 1907 there were only automobiles. The drive featured region's historical sites, forests, and on to the coastal scenic attractions in the Hotel Del Monte Park Reservation, as it was known at the time.

thumb|150px|The Hotel Del Monte rebuilt in 1926, now Herrmann Hall

Drawn by six bay horses, President Benjamin Harrison took the coach ride through the reservation in 1891. The coach was adorned with the national colors "and the harness on the horses was lined with bunting and roses as far as possible." In the newspaper The Monterey Cypress, President Harrison noted "This is a lovely spot. I only wish I could stay here a week."

In 1887, the hotel was destroyed by fire and replaced with a new structure. The Del Monte Golf Course was added in 1897 as part of the hotel and is today the oldest operating course west of the Mississippi. In 1919, the Los Angeles Times called the 17-Mile Drive one of the "great wonders of the world." Another fire destroyed that structure and was replaced by a third hotel. This new hotel was finished in 1926 and requisitioned by the United States government as a training facility in 1942.

Scenic attractions

thumb|130px|left|The [[Lone Cypress prior to the Pineapple Express of 2019 ]]

Primary scenic attractions include Cypress Point, Bird Rock, Point Joe, Pescadero Point, Fanshell Beach & Seal Point. The famous "Witch Tree" landmark, often used as scenic background in movies and television, was formerly at Pescadero Point. The tree was blown down by a storm on January 14, 1964. Pescadero Point is also the site of the Ghost Tree, a landmark Monterey Cypress tree. The tree gives its name to a dangerous extreme surfing location known to have storm waves. Currently, the surf break of Ghost Tree is off limits to surfers and watercraft.

Chief among the scenic attractions is the Lone Cypress, a salt-pruned Monterey cypress (macrocarpa) tree which is the official symbol of Pebble Beach and a frequent fixture of television broadcasts from this area. In 1990 the Monterey Journal reported that Pebble Beach's lawyer, Kerry C. Smith, said "The image of the tree has been trademarked by us," and that it intended to control any display of the cypress for commercial purposes. The company had warned photographers that "they cannot even use existing pictures of the tree for commercial purposes".

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File:17 Mile Drive photo D Ramey Logan.jpg|Beach near the Pacific Grove entrance of the 17-Mile Drive

File:17 Mile Drive cropped.jpg|Beach access near golf links at Pebble Beach

File:17 Mile Drive Bird Rock.jpg|Bird Rock

File:Seal Curiosity.JPG|Seal seen along 17-Mile Drive

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References

  • Pebble Beach Resorts: 17-Mile Drive
  • Photographic description of the whole of 17-Mile Drive.