The hook
The farm-labor leader who changed California is buried in a rose garden at the union headquarters he built in the Tehachapi foothills.
01Why it's worth it
Nuestra Señora Reina de la Paz — "Our Lady Queen of Peace," or just La Paz — is where César Chávez ran the United Farm Workers from the early 1970s until he died in 1993, and where he is buried alongside his wife Helen in a garden he helped lay out. President Obama made it a National Monument in 2012. It's a quiet place: a visitor center that tells the story of the farmworker movement, the boycotts and the fasts and the long fight for the people who pick California's food, and the memorial garden with the graves. Parts of the property are still off-limits because the Chávez family lives there and the union still works out of the offices, which is fitting for a monument to a movement that isn't finished. In a valley built on farm labor, it is the one place that honors the laborers.
02How to experience it
It's in Keene, off Highway 58 between Bakersfield and Tehachapi, about four hours from the Bay. The visitor center and memorial garden are open to the public on a limited schedule and free; check the days before you go. It's a sober stop, not a scenic one, and a natural pause crossing the Tehachapis or heading for the southern Sierra.