Until the railroads were built, the only way for passengers and freight to get around California was by stage or steamer. Because of the rugged coastal mountain ranges, coastal railroads were not completed until 1901, and thus stagecoaching persisted along the California coast much longer than it did elsewhere.

From 1862 until 1901 the coastal route was served by the Coast Line Stage Company, whose Concords and mud wagons plied the rough and often treacherous roads from Los Angeles to San Juan Bautista, with stops in Encino, Calabasas, Camarillo, Ventura, Santa Barbara, Los Olivos, Los Alamos, San Luis Obispo, Paso Robles, San Miguel, Salinas, and many small towns and ranchos in between.

A hundred years have passed, but reminders of the Coast Line Stage are everywhere along its route - at inns and stables, on roads still in use, and in oak-studded canyons and valleys that haven't changed at all since they last heard the clatter of hooves and the rumble of ironclad wheels.