Santa Barbara is a city with European small town charm and is therefore often referred to as the American Riviera. There are beautiful palm-lined streets in the city center with many nice stores, cafes and restaurants.
Furthermore the beach and the pier ‘Stearns Wharf’ offer a great opportunity to relax and to listen to the sound of the ocean.
Santa Barbara is located about 1.5 hours from Los Angeles and has about 90,000 inhabitants. Some of them are celebrities because they prefer living in a more quiet city than living in the hustle and bustle of Los Angeles. They usually buy a house in the neighborhood of Montecito, Santa Barbara. Talk show hosts Oprah Winfrey and Ellen DeGeneres, for example, own houses in this part of town.
The best view of Santa Barbara and the surrounding Santa Ynez Mountains is from the tower of the courthouse. The admission is free and you will be taken up to the tower by an elevator. And what can I say…the view was simply breathtakingly beautiful!
The interior of the courthouse is also worth seeing. Completed in 1929, the building was designed in the Spanish Colonial style and looks just great. You can visit the library or a courtroom, for example. For more information about the Santa Barbara County Courthouse click here.
You can either stop in Santa Barbara when you’re on a road trip on the PCH (that’s what my friend Tori and I did) or you could plan a day trip to the ‘American Riviera’ when you’re visiting Los Angeles. I promise that you will not regret it because this town really has a unique American Mediterranean charm.
xx
Alissa
