hi there, haven't been on here in a while and our plans have changed a lot in the meantime! four of us are planning a trip this summer and some of the hotels etc are booked already. if anyone has any advice to offer or can direct me to relevant threads I would appreciate it.

20th June - arrive in LA
21st, 22nd, 23rd - in LA
24th - LA to Santa Barbara (2hrs??)
25th - Santa Barbara to Santa Cruz along the coast (6hrs??)
26th - Santa Cruz through San Fran (see the bridge) to Yosemite (6hrs??)
27th - looking round Yosemite
28th - Yosemite through Death Valley to Vegas (8hrs??)
29th, 30th, 1st July - Las Vegas
2nd - Vegas back to LA
3rd - fly to New York for a few days

obviously Google Maps can only get you so far so any real-life experience anyone can offer would be great. as you can see we have opted for spending longer in each place and doing longer stretches of driving as a result - are there any problems we are overlooking? is the long drive on the 28th too ambitious? should we leave LA a day earlier and have a night in SF?

I've seen one or two good threads on part of this journey already so I'll keep looking around... and hopefully post photos when we get back! thanks everyone.