City of Carpinteria

Carpinteria is the best little beach town around. When the Spanish arrived they found Chumash sitting on the beach building canoes and using the tar pits to seal them. The tar pits are still here but I rarely get tar on my feet when walking the wide sandy beach at the end of Linden Street.
The perfect beach day for me includes lunch at Cabo grill with margaritas, or maybe trying out the new brew pub also on Carpinteria Avenue. I either walk or drive down Linden and park in the free parking lot at the end of the street. I leave my shoes in the car and stroll out on the soft sand and take a long beach walk.
If I get here earlier I will take the walk first then park behind Crush Cakes and have a nice salad or burrito and some iced tea on their patio and then check out the antique stores and specialty shops on Linden.
The city recently added a large playground area in the large park by the state beach. There are some nice sculptures around town and there’s even a Vons in the middle of town to pick up a lunch so you can enjoy the several picnic areas down near the beach.

This little beach town is awesome! If you can’t find a room in Santa Barbara or you just want to relax and chill this is the place.

We’ve always passed through Carpinteria, but we never stopped and we always wanted to visit it.
It’s a small beach town, along the coast, past Ventura (15 minutes), before you reach Santa Barbara.
We wanted to check out its main street, Linden Ave and parked on 8^th street. There’s a lot of street parking in the area, free, so that was nice.
We enjoyed strolling around these nice, cute streets, full of Jacaranda trees in bloom.
Linden Ave is the main street that takes you down to the beach and the campgrounds. There are cute stores along, restaurants, too bad some were closed at the time we got there, around 4 pm. A nice Mexican bakery was opened and a few restaurants that look good: Mexican, seafood, Italian, a wine bar. We’d like to check some of them out in the future.
It doesn’t take more than 30 minutes to check everything out.
The locals are friendly and helpful, stop to chat with you and help with directions and recommendations. That was nice.
We had dinner at The Spot, near the beach, at that was fun and sample some beers at the Island Brewing Company, a very cool experience.
Carpinteria has a nice vibe, it’s a place where you can relax and take a break from it all. If you’re in the area and you’d like to take a side trip and want to spend some time on the beach, this could be a nice spot.

We stayed at a hotel here in the sleepy seaside town. The neighborhood is nicely kept and the hotels are all lined on Carpinteria Ave. There is a corner plaza with retail and Starbucks off Casitas and Carpinteria, which is a plus. It’s about 10 – 15 mins to Santa Barbara and other neighboring tourist attractions. We’ll consider coming back here again for lodging if we plan on another weekend getaway around here.

I’ve lived all over Southern California my entire life, but Carpinteria is the place I most love. This is where I will live out the rest of my years. Perfect weather, clean beaches, small town that won’t get big. Santa Barbara, Montecito, and Summerland are nice but Carpinteria is for me.

I LOVE CARPINTERIA! I could go on for days and days, this place is my HOME. I have never been more in love in an area than the way I feel about Carpinteria. The beaches here are so private and well taken care of. I want to save up all my money forever and retire here. I hope I stay here and raise a family because this place is gorgeous. The camp site is beachside and the lovely small town feel remains here as corporations have yet to ruin this town (whew). It is a quiet, sleepy beach town and I love that it remains that way. This town is also huge with animals and lots of people walk around with their pets which I love. Farmers market is thursdays and every first friday of each month is «first fridays» where all the small businesses stay open way later and live music comes from so many different local businesses. I love Carpinteria~!

Nice small town feel — seems safe and weather is so nice here! While other beaches nearby were much hotter — this area was just perfect. If you like to relax on the beach with the kids where it is not too crowded — this is the place to go!

Carpinteria is a great California beach town. –A happy escape from my nearby metropolis. Messy, low fidelity, reckless and wild, she is a sweet alternative to posh beach cities.
Campfires leave the beaches in mesquite clouds at dusk. Waves carry surfboards into the sunset, and families find holiday here where an ocean-​view room can be had for modest means.
A Thursday night Farmer’s market brings live music, fruit and art to the quaint streets of Carpinteria’s downtown. Grab some guacamole and don’t forget to tip the man playing the blues.
The secret scoop: Carpinteria is a great place to throw a bachelorette party. It is a wardrobe change venue for many a surfer to and from wetsuit. A towel clad man at the side of the road is a common sighting. Enter the solution for all my fellow bachelorette-​party-​throwing lasses
Borrow, rent or buy a convertible, bring the bride to be with you and be here in the morning just before high tide or at sunset, just after. When you see the surfers at the side of the road in wetsuits. Park.
Dress in conservative layers (you’ll need them) over your bikini that you wear because it doesn’t show any tan lines. Wear your black rimmed glasses and your hair pulled back.
Put the top down. Play Joe Cocker’s «You can leave your hat on» or Di Angelo’s «How does it feel» (my favorite) Ladies, make eye contact with your new found friends.
Undo your ponytail, take your glasses off, pull your turtleneck sweater off. Pause. Stretch your arms out in front of you, palms side up, palms flat. Touch your fingers to your palms several times as an invitation.
Invitation to what? To get a boy to dance for the girls! (PG 13 rating!) Sheesh! What did you think I was talking about! Fair is fair right? Trade a dance for a dance. Drive off into the sunset and spend your savings on pints for your soon to be married girlfriend. Good luck;-)
*Cheers girls*

If I had all the money in the world and could live anywhere and do nothing but drink margaritas on the beach, I would live in Carp. Its such a great small town, you can walk everywhere, it has a total of (I believe) 2 stoplights in the whole ‘city’, the beaches are always clean, its a safe town, and the locals are great.
Sadly, I do not have all the money in the world, or even just enough to get by without having to work another day in my life. So I no longer call Carp my home (I was lucky enough to call it home for a short time), but I do go back for vacation and sit at the same spot on the beach with the other locals.

What a wonderful little town! We walked right up and down the main street of Carpinteria around dusk. It was quiet, and all the shops were closed (after all, small town) — but it had such a nice feeling. People were nice, everything was clean and well kept up. And we ended the walk with a really nice dinner at the Thai Elephant place.
The best part of Carpinteria in our too-​short stay was the beach. The beach ROCKS here, and is right near the downtown. We’re so coming back here and having a couple of awesome beach-​days — I plan to get lots of boogie-​boarding in.
Living here must be awesome with such a beautiful, warm, clean beach on your doorstep. Our Ocean Beach in SF wishes it was the Carpinteria beach here. And with so much stuff nearby, yet with a small town feel, this seems like it’d be such a great place to be.