From Montecito's wooded hills to Hope Ranch's riding trails and
the Santa Ynez Valley's wide open spaces, Santa Barbara's renowned
beauty is more than skin deep. Active, community-minded residents
have shaped this metropolitan area into a well-rounded, multifaceted
gem of a place for the discriminating person to live and work.
Opportunities abound in Santa Barbara to enjoy
a life tailored your individual needs. There's quality shopping,
over 400 fine restaurants, top educational institutions such a s
the University of California, and easy jet and rail transportation
for those whose lifestyles keep themon the move.
This site is all about buying or selling homes, but it's also important
to get a quick idea of the various key areas along the coast here.
Please click on any of the following links to explore a little more.
CARPINTERIA
Carpinteria is a peaceful, seaside city located in the fertile Carpinteria
Valley just south of Montecito. Come soak up the sunshine at the
beach or simply enjoy the small town pleasures of Carpinteria where
tree-shaded streets, parades and crafts shows evoke a gentle way
of life.
Home to a world-renowned surfing area off Rincon Point and a beautiful
swimming beach. Carpinteria State Beach Park encompasses wooded groves
and 4,000 feet of ocean frontage and offers overnight camping and
the best surf-fishing and tide-pooling for miles around.
MONTECITO
Once a fashionable health resort, the tiny seaside village of Montecito
was discovered just after the turn of the century by some of the
most influential families in the United States. Soon the wooded Montecito
hills, just east of Santa Barbara's city limits began to sprout such
magnificent creations as marble palaces, picture-book Normandy castles,
elegant Italian palazzos, gracious Cape Cod colonials, and regal
English manor houses. For those looking for private schools, country
clubs, quaint shops, and quiet lanes that lead to secluded homes,
the beach, mountain trails, creeks, and waterfalls - pastoral Montecito
is waiting, pristine.
Just south of Montecito is a quaint beach community named Summerland;
a relaxed, hillside community snuggled on the coast with breathtaking
ocean and island views. Today it is a thriving beach community with
1,545 residents living in 785 homes, condos, or apartments. Summerland
is known up and down California for its wonderful weather, friendly
residents, good restaurants, outstanding beach, and wonderful antique
stores.
SANTA BARBARA
Santa Barbara has a diversity of residential areas. Made up of many
neighborhoods and areas you will find information provided on several
below.
Mesa
The Mesa is located on the bluffs just beyond the harbor and extends
from the ocean up to the top of the hill. There are both tract
and custom homes, many with ocean and/or city views. San Roque
is a charming area with smaller, individual homes in a quiet, yet
convenient in-town location. Architectural styles range from small
California cottages to classic Tudors and Spanish haciendas.
The Wilcox Property, now known as the as the Douglas Family Preserve,
at southwestern tip of the Mesa was a commercial nursery, currently
preserved for public use. The neighborhood between Mesa Lane and
Oliver Road, while originally plotted as early as 1920, did not develop
until after World War II when many veterans built homes with the
help of GI loans.City weather records show that the Mesa's winter
temperatures are 10 to 12 degrees warmer than downtown, and 10 to
12 degrees cooler in the summer.
Westside
The "Westside Story" of Santa Barbara is laid in our city's
first suburb to be initiated by Anglos rather than Hispanics; the
Spanish genesis of the city was located on the Eastside. In 1850,
when the United States annexed California to the Union, the Westside
was open grazing range and farmland, turning marshy near the beach.
Today this area is solidly overlaid with urban development extending
inland to the Goleta Valley, making it the most densely populated
neighborhood in Santa Barbara. The earliest historical reference
to the Westside came in 1793 when Captain George Vancouver, a British
explorer-scientist, who was circumnavigating the globe, anchored
the Discovery off West Beach and received permission for his seacook
to chop stovewood from the Mesa oak groves and refill his water tanks
from a steep at the base of the Mesa bluffs near Pershing Park.
Mission Canyon
Mission Canyon, which with the Old Mission complex and the area bounded
on the south by Mission Street, making up Santa Barbara's "Mission
District," is unique. No residential neighborhood in the city
boasts a richer historical background, or offers more relics and
landmarks of Old Spanish Days.Fr. Junipero Serra, when he helped
found the Royal Presidio of Santa Barbara in 1782, intended Santa
Barbara's Franciscan mission to be built in El Montecito near the
present site of Our Lady of Mount Carmel church on East Valley
Road. But four years later, when his successor, Fr. Fermin Lasuen
OFM, arrived to establish our mission, he decided that Montecito
was too infested with grizzly bears and renegade Indians to risk
building a mission so far removed from the protection of the presidio
soldiers, so he looked elsewhere.
San Roque
Few residential neighborhoods of Santa Barbara can boast the rich
historical background of the San Roque and Rutherford Park areas.
Ten thousand years ago the area, bounded by Ontare Road, Foothill
Road, Alamar Avenue and State Street, was an open expanse of treeless
grassland, sloping up to the knees of the foothills and bisected
by the jungled course of San Roque Canyon. Now a built-up, economically
stabilized suburb, it is admired for its sweeping curved streets,
its luxuriant landscaping, and its harmonious blend of many architectural
themes - Spanish Colonial, English Tudor, French Normandy, California
Redwood, Italian and American Colonial, mostly built since 1925.
San Roque features older, custom homes with charm.
Samarkand
Samarkand meant "the land of heart's desire" in the archaic
Persian tongue. It identified the fabulous Asian city where a mythical
Queen Scheherazade spent her 1001 Arabian nights. In Santa Barbara,
the melodic oriental name was first applied in 1920 to a deluxe Persian
style hotel, formerly a boy's school. As the dominating landmark
of a hilly, elevated neighborhood, the Samarkand gave its name to
an area bounded on the east by Oak Park, on the north by Hollister
Avenue (now De La Vina Street), on the west by a ranch boundary fence
centered on modern Las Positas Road, and on the south by the old
Coast Highway and the railroad. Samarkand is a delightful area of
homes full of charm.
The Riviera
Bridging the two mile span which separates Mission and Sycamore Canyons,
the sylvan uplift which the padres knew as the "mission ridge" has
for the past 65 years been known as "the Riviera" due
to its resemblance to slopes along the Mediterranean coasts of
France and Italy. Santa Barbarans lucky enough to live on this
ridge attach premium value to their homes because of their unsurpassed
views of the city, mountains, sea and islands.
The Waterfront
The Spaniards who founded Santa Barbara in 1782 were soldiers and
priests, not seafaring men. Perhaps that is why no provision was
made for a seaport. The waterfront, extending 3.6 miles from Shoreline
Park to the Bird Refuge, offers no natural headlands to create
a safe anchorage. Early-day mariners dreaded Santa Barbara's exposed
roadstead so much they used to drop anchor a mile offshore, ready
to slip their cables and head for the open sea if foul weather
threatened. As recently as 70 years ago the ocean used to cover
what today is the City College football field, dashing its surf
against cliffs now paneled by La Playa Stadium. Leadbetter Beach
did not exist. But just around the corner, east of Castle Rock
(a long-vanished promontory), semi-sheltered West Beach became
the traditional landing place for visitors. It is thus overlaid
with history covering two centuries.
The Santa Barbara Waterfront stretches from the Harbor across from
Santa Barbara City College along Cabrillo Boulevard past Stearns
Wharf to East Beach, which is near the Santa Barbara Zoo and Bird
Refuge. There are Hotels and Motels located along the Waterfront,
but behind them are charming homes, duplexes, triplexes and apartment
buildings.
HOPE RANCH
As you pass through the gate and under the handsome, fillgreed sign
suspended across Las Palmas Drive, you enter another world named
Hope Ranch. Towering plams, planted in the early 1900's, line the
main drive. Wearing jodhpursand shiny black boots; young children
on horseback gallop along the tree-lined trails. An early morning
jogger circles Laguna Blanca lake.
Hope Ranch is a community encompassing 1,863 acre. It is situated
in the southeastern portion of Santa Barbara County between Highway
101 and the ocean. It consists of a broad flat mesa andlow rolling
knolls broken by a magnificent valley and covered with splendid live
oaks. The scenery from the home sites on the knolls is indescribably
beautiful.
A golfing foursome takes turns putting on a manicured green at the
La Cumbre Country Club. Incorporated in 1924, the Hope Ranch Park
Homes Association watches over this elite residential area. Membership
in the association is automatic upon purchasing a home and brings
many privileges: the private beach, bridle paths, tennis courts,
and the advantages of the Hope Ranch Riding Trails Association.
