Read before you come out West for a visit... Hello, For as long as we remember, every time we drove by Carpenteria, a small city on the Santa Barbara coastline, we saw the huge Santa sticking up in the air. The name of the exit was Santa Claus Lane. It was a tourist attraction and the parking lot was usually full of folks, local and visiting the West coast. Our dad stopped there plenty of times. Each time, there was something new for us to stop and get a bite to eat or shop for trinkets. As we got older, on our surf trips to Rincon Point for surfing, just up the coast, we had to stop to get snacks for our trip home. Every time we drove up or down the coastline during our college days, we stopped. Why? Well, it was a good rest stop after two+ hours of driving. Plus, it gave us a good place to get a snack. The stops became standard for our own son and it was a mandatory stopover when we visited my brother in Santa Barbara. It was just one of those things that made driving two hours more fun for all. The huge Santa stood out for miles either way and the small city drew tons of travelers for a nice rest stop. Jnaki Even as close as our 2019 road trip down the Coastal Highway, the lonely off ramp still had some visitors to the quaint shops that sit on the beach cliffside for a well deserved rest stop on their travels. It is a nice beach below, but most travelers zip by the off ramp to continue their high speed coastal road trips. “Santa’s Village at Santa Claus Lane is now a thing of the past, gone. Newcomers to Carpinteria must surely be baffled by the lane’s name that offers little trace of its Christmas past. New shop owners on the lane have petitioned the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors to rename it, to no avail.” “As far as the creations that once graced the roof tops of Santa Claus Lane, one can still catch a glimpse of the original Santa’s head and torso. Look to the mountainside of the 101 Freeway between Rice Road and Del Norte Avenue next time you are traveling through Oxnard.” Still greeting folks, but in a different way and place… YRMV
The Jalopy Journal
