Posted on 12/26/2011 6:19:09 PM PST by Allen In Texas Hill Country
Just got back from our latest cruise, LA to Hawaii and back. But before we boarded the ship we spent a few days in Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo. We get back there every couple of years still having family and friends there. Seeing Santa Barbara again makes me throw out this bit of hyperbole/speculation.
Of all the places/cities/towns where people live Santa Barbara and the surrounding area might be the most beautiful on earth. Of course I (nor anyone else) have seen the entire world and never will but IMHO it must be. Said with prejudice. Check the URL
I attended University of California there for two years. Really a great area. And amazing weather for a northern-california kid. Swam/SCUBA dived almost every weekend and rode my bike all over that area every chance I got.
If only I could have found a job there...
I'm pretty sure SB resident Dennis Miller said a combination of from fiscally responsible SB taxpayers, and world-wide ridicule, put that project on hold.
All the Okies and Arkies have gone back home as soon as they were able to leave. Bakersfield has been taken over by illegals. They are not just in one part of town, you can’t escape them. They are everywhere you go.
We also have a huge gang problem and finally it doesn’t seem to matter where you live anymore. Even the best neighborhoods are subjected to home invasions and burglaries.
I love Bakersfield and it has been my home for most of my life but it is now a pit.
I agree! The People’s Republic of SB is beautiful! My television producer, sister and her entertainment industry lawyer, husband have lived there for years.
I visit each Christmas, passing by Oprah’s home on the way. |^ :
What a shame! That's so typical of what a destructive force liberalism is. I want my country back...and I want Bakersfield restored to the place I remembered so fondly.
Has the scourge of the illegal Mexican swarm gotten up to Fresno and other parts of the north valley as well?
Gawd only knows what it’s like now.
Actually hasn’t changed much, still Main St with a variety/hardware store and now more coffee shops and the Spot is still serving burgers...began summer vacations there is ‘54 and continued through teen years at the world’s safest beach! Wish I could afford to retire there...
ymmv
We stay at the Montecito Inn whenever we're down there. If I had to live in SoCA it'd definitely make my list.
Thanks for the reminder on where I heard about that brilliant idea. I’m surprised if it doesn’t come back. Liberal ideas never really die.
We stay at the Montecito Inn
....excellent restaurant there now, used to stay at the condos across from the Four Seasons ay back when it was still called Bonnymeade. Beautiful area, but always liked the Carp breakers better than the calm SB “surf”...
anywhere from Ventura to SLO would be a great place to retire, if they could get rid of the socialists in Sacto!
ymmv
Sounds like you might like to surf...
Yes, Santa Barbara is physically quite beautiful. My wife did a postdoc there six years ago, and I spent a bit of time visiting her there. The one problem is the people: the place is overrun with odious nouveau riche who treat the folks who work in shops and more generally any service industry (whether “Anglo”, legal Hispanic or illegal immigrant) like dirt. We once got stuck getting out of the airport behind a shrieking harpy (lawyer by her dress — tailored suit, coral ear-rings and matching necklace, briefcase) who kept insisting that the parking attendant get her car for her. The Santa Barbara Airport does not have valet parking.
Even when in California, I usually dress in a manner the could pass for East Coast or British old money slumming slightly
(tweed sportcoat, shirt and tie), and I’d resolved the next time I saw anything like that I would affect an even more pronounced mid-Atlantic accent than I actually have, and sneer “Oh! I see what I was told was true. Money and breeding don’t go together here!” loud enough that the moneyed lout could hear me.
I never got the chance. But my resolve holds, as I expect to get back sometime — the place really is beautiful. My wife and I want to fly into SB next time either of us has a conference in the Bay Area with enough lead time (which happens fairly often), stay a few days in SB, then drive a rental convertible up the coast highway.
We fell in love with the area around Rancho Murietta and thought seriously about moving there in spite of all the crazy whackos in Sacramento. What keeps us from moving to anywhere in CA is their gun laws.
Of course. The whole central valley, especially the smaller towns looks like Mexico. I was raised in Lamont, outside of Bakersfield when it was a farming town of Okies and Arkies. The latest stats are 93% Hispanic and they have a 30 something percent unemployment.
This feeling is also what led my husband and I to move to Santa Barbara. We love it here (except the liberals) and love that the Reagan Ranch is so close by. Housing prices are down. All conservatives come join us :-D!!!!
Sounds like a fantastic game plan. Please do make it happen. We do this at least once a year and every time feels like the first.
pingarama :)
I hear San Antonio is beautiful and compelling as well. Will try to make it down there one day.
If you ever get a chance, check out my neck of the woods, the Eastern High Sierra, 85 miles from Fresno as the crow flies, but six hours by highway due to the High Sierra mountain range blocking the way. God fearing real American Conservatives and the most beautiful rural landscape you have ever seen; 14,000’ snow capped mountains and thousands of square miles of wide open, uninhabited country where one can roam free to hunt, fish, and camp undisturbed.
Where in California do you live?
Had a tour of the Reagan Ranch which was well-worth it. Not sure it is open to the public yet, but you can check at the Reagan Center, downtown, near the train station, which is also worth a quick tour. Second the Arigato Sushi, have eaten there many times. Santa Barbara, “Home of the newly-wed and the nearly dead”!!!
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