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The six-lane coastal freeway that races past oil
wells and offshore drilling platforms slows to a leisurely pace
a hundred miles north of Los Angeles at SANTA BARBARA
. Beautifully sited on gently sloping hills above the Pacific,
the town's ubiquitous red-tiled roofs and white stucco walls of
its low-rise buildings form a backdrop to some fine Spanish Revival
architecture, while the golden beaches are wide and clean, lined
by palm trees along a curving bay. Although a large portion of
downtown has been replaced by a vast, upscale shopping mall, Santa
Barbara has managed to retain its quaintly upscale yet relaxed
character.
The mission-era feel of Santa Barbara is no accident.
Following a devastating earthquake in 1925, the entire town was
rebuilt in the image of an apocryphal Spanish Colonial past, with
numerous arcades linking shops, caf?s and restaurants, and a pedestrian-friendly
layout that serves visitors well - a far cry from LA's all-consuming
auto-worship. State Street , the main drag, is
home to an appealing assortment of diners, bookshops, coffee bars
and nightclubs. The few remaining genuine mission structures are
preserved as El Presidio de Santa Barbara (daily
10.30am-4.30pm; suggested donation). At its center, the 200-year-old
barracks, El Cuartel , stands two blocks off
State Street on Perdido Street; the second-oldest building in
California, it now houses historical exhibits and a scale model
of the small Spanish colony. The more recent past is recounted
in the nearby Santa Barbara Historical Museum
, 136 E de la Guerra St (Tues-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun noon-5pm; suggested
donation), full of Spanish and Victorian memorabilia.
State Street leads half a mile down from the town
center to wooden Stearns Wharf . Built in 1872,
it was nearly destroyed in November 1998, when a third of the
pier was engulfed in flames; restoration efforts have now made
it home to an array of shopping stalls and food vendors, with
magnificent beaches stretching in either direction.
In the hills above the town is the beautiful Mission
Santa Barbara (daily 9am-5pm; $4), with a colorful twin-towered
facade, the so-called "Queen of the Missions," though
it was one of the later ones constructed in California. A small
museum displays artifacts from the mission archives.
Other missions in the area are Santa In?s, just outside the kitsch
Danish town of Solvang heading north on US-101,
and La Pur?sima, the most completely restructured of all the missions,
about twenty miles northwest of Solvang on Hwy-1.
