Santa Claus Beach

Favorite beach in Santa Barbara area. The sand is always so clean witch a beautiful flat area. This is definitely a local favorite and it’s always cool to cross the railroad tracks to get there. There’s a little rock wall that offers some nice places to sit if you forgot your towel. Busy on the weekends but so peaceful on weekday mornings.
Gorgeous views of Santa Barbara as well as the mountains. And despite it being right of the freeway, no traffic noise — what more could you ask for?

I guess I should probably start of saying that this is definitely one of the nicest beaches I’ve seen in SoCal; and saying I come from Hawaii, hopefully adds some gravity to that statement. Haha.
We were there on a Saturday afternoon and stumbled upon it completely by mistake. The sand is nice, soft, white and clean, the waves were actually somewhat breaking along the shore, it was nice peaceful and quite, with hardly anyone there. Parking is free and along the railroad tracks, and the beach is right there on the other side of the tracks. If you find yourself getting hungry, there are a lot of great restaurants a stone’s throw away at the end of the beach.
I guess one more thing to note, while we were there a wedding party showed up and started taking wedding pictures there along the train tracks. Maybe that can also attest to its photogenicity? Hahah.
I would definitely recommend checking this place out, but shhhh, let’s keep it our little secret.