Northern California Beach Town Vacation

We love Santa Cruz and Monterey. One of the placeswe used to go before the kids was Capitola, there is a great hotel called the Venitian Inn. We uesed to get a place that had one bedroom, a livingroom and little kitchen. They have other ones with 2-3 bedrooms also. Lots of fun!

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Capitola is really cute - cute downtown, with shops & cafes, even wine tasting, and beaches that aren't too rough. Also it's close to Santa Cruz, so you can go for an outing up to the city - it's really funky, fun. And for kids there's an awesome state beach where you can discover sea creatures in the tidal pools - it's called "Natural Bridges State Beach".
Everytime we've gone, we've found great lodging on vrbo.

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Hmmm.
We live in the REAL Northern California, just under the Oregon border.

The beaches here are lovely if you don't mind the wind ripping your hair off and freezing to death. You don't dare get in the water without a wet suit.
I moved here from Fremont and learned really quickly that beaches here are not like beaches in Monterey or Half Moon Bay.

It's just my opinion, but there's nothing worse than freezing at the beach. I don't know how "Northern" you plan to go, but the beaches here can be pretty treacherous.

Monterey and Carmel are nice.
Farther north, much farther, Ruth lake is nice. It's not the beach, but it's warm and they have little stores and a nice restaurant. My son and I spent a weekend at a cabin, no TV, pretty rustic, but it was really relaxing.

I hope you get some great responses.

Best wishes.

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Carmel is very pretty. Clint Eastwood used to be the mayor. We went there for Christmas, nice beaches and beautiful downtown area. The weather is usually very perfect.

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We *love* Capitola - it has a great beach with a lifeguard, and it's a super-nice little town with wonderful places to eat, and fun places to shop (even a shell shop and a thrift store!). It's also sunnier than many northern CA beaches, especially if you go after noon time or so.

You would be hard pressed to find prettier beaches then my hometown has anywhere in the world but swimming is not advised at most. We do have a couple very protected coves that you could actually swim in but it will be very chilly.

Now if you want to walk the beach, have a bonfire, play in the waves, surf with a wetsuit or just enjoy the scenery Carmel/Monterey is the place to do it. In fact there are so many fun activities around here you'd want to have plenty of time enjoy more than the beach.

What about a Stinson Beach or Bolinas day trip? We love the coast past SF and you are so close. Good luck with your travel plans!

I like all the places listed below but we also like Bodega Bay up north and love Big Sir down south. Have fun!

I've heard of people going to Dillion Beach in Marin...there's also a beach in Alameda - crab beach? It seemed a little dirty, though. Santa Cruz is OK if you get sun. But for a beach vacation you need to go south or east.

We love to go camping at Lawson's Landing (Dillon Beach). If you don't camp, there are rental houses and there is a cute town inland Tomales that has B & Bs. Santa Cruz is also fun. However, our favorite place to stay is Pacific Grove next to Monterey. We stay at Andril Fireplace cottages. The Asilomar beach is a short walk away. If you get lucky you can play in the water. At times we see surfers, but they are not without wet suits. There are many fun things to do and see and Santa Cruz is about an hour drive if I recall correctly.

Many of my friends like to visit Ft. Bragg, but the weather and water up there is too chilly for my liking. Also, the road there is curvy. Have fun whereever you decide.

I personally wouldn't go north of Pismo to hang out on a beach ;) But maybe you aren't thinking so much of the "hanging out on the beach" part as you are the "town" part. In that case... monterey or santa cruz? If I went north of that in our state I'd go to the forest or the coastal redwood area.