Growing up in Carlsbad, I never quite understood why people vacationed there. What, so you want to check out the field where I have soccer practice? Pay my orthodontist a visit? Carlsbad just felt like a town by the beach, no better or worse than any other in the country. It took going to college out of state for me to actually understand just how rare a place like Carlsbad is.

Thanksgiving break my freshman year, my first time coming home after three months in the Midwest, my shoulders dropped. I rolled down the windows and drove to lifeguard tower 37—the hangout magnet for Carlsbad’s youths (and, in the summer, tourists)—and the smells of the ocean woke me right up like smelling salts do. I finally got it.

Carlsbad isn’t just a stopover town on your way to something better. It is the destination. Travel + Leisure named Carlsbad one of the top 50 places around the world to travel in 2026. From the whole globe, the travel magazine picked my home. Sure, we’ve got the Flower Fields and Legoland—but now it’s the smaller ships and indier dreams that are giving it street-level character.

June 18, 2026

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It’s not just Carlsbad, either. People have talked about the “North County bubble” for decades—a force field that prevents its residents from traveling south of the 56. It’s often used derogatorily, and it’s a fairly accurate burn.

For decades, living up in North County meant giving up on culture, or at least culture within close proximity. But now, the main expansion of San Diego culture is happening up north. Central San Diego restaurants have started taking notice and are expanding into the area—spurred no doubt by Oceanside’s food boom and the Jeune et Jolie–Campfire–Wildland–Lilo constellation in Carlsbad. City Heights burger joint Key & Cleaver opened a new spot in Oceanside; the owners of Parc Bistro-Brasserie in Bankers Hill opened Parc Lounge in Rancho Santa Fe. Possibly the strongest market indicator is that Sam Fox—one of the most successful restaurateurs west of the Rockies—has started focusing on North County for his concepts. In 2025, he opened both The Henry in Carlsbad and Culinary Dropout in Del Mar.

For the ultimate insider guide, we found a handful of inspiring people who live and create and truly know six North County neighborhoods—San Marcos, Escondido, Oceanside, Leucadia, Rancho Santa Fe, and Vista—and asked them how they’d spend a dream day out and about in their town.

San Marcos

San Marcos is in full renaissance mode. The biggest story is that the grand North City vision is starting to peek through the scaffolding. It’s essentially the North County Downtown that’s been written in the tea leaves and discussed whenever someone gets stuck in traffic at the 5/805 merge: a 200-acre, pedestrian-friendly, mixed-use face-changer that’s slated for 2,600 homes, 350,000 square feet of retail and restaurants, 250 hotel rooms, and about a million square feet of offices and labs. Its most recent manifestation is 222 North City—a 12-story residential tower with over 450 residences, rooftop garden, pool cabanas, art installations, and almost 20,000 square feet of ground-floor retail (Necessity Coffee, Buona Forchetta, Draft Republic, Milonga Empanadas, and a grocery store anchor on its way).

Which means Restaurant Row is no longer burdened with being the primary caregiver for the hungry or the socially inclined. Patricia Prado-Olmos has watched the city morph during her nearly three-decade tenure at CSUSM, having spent the past six years as the school’s chief community engagement officer. She also just announced her forthcoming retirement at the end of the 2026–2027 school year, so she’ll have even more time to haunt local haunts.

Meet the Local: Patricia Prado-Olmos

Those in the know call the university “Cal State StairMaster” from the Sisyphean amount of stairs on the hillside campus. So, any day at or around CSUSM should start with a homestyle carbo-load (biscuits and gravy) from Mama Kat’s.

“There’s something about this breakfast spot that immediately puts me in a good mood,” she says. Mama Kat’s is also known for its pie (strawberry-rhubarb), which is breakfast if you change your perspective.

After a few hours on campus—with a break to pet the university’s official therapy goldendoodle, Frank, who helps ease finals tremors or apprehension of on-campus stairs—Prado-Olmos will wander into North City, just steps away. She says the almond croissant and coffee at Christophe Rull Patisserie rival Parisian cafés: “It feels like the kind of place you’d stumble across in a much bigger city.”

Rull, a Michelin-trained pastry chef who’s done stints on Netflix (Bake Squad) and Food Network (Super Mega Cakes, Halloween Wars), opened his patisserie last fall. The hype hasn’t cooled off yet: Get there early because the crowds do.

Slip into the moment: You’re strolling through Surf Sports Park in the fall outfit you’ve been dying to wear, maybe even snagging some handmade jewelry with rare natural gemstones from Timka Jewelry while sipping locally made hard kombucha and snacking on Michelin-starred must-try meals from San Diego restaurants. In the background, celebrity chefs mingle by small parties with DJs spinning and professional athletes passing by floral photo ops that are basically made to be framed. You pause for a wine pour that looks almost too good to drink and catch acclaimed talents like Jackson Kalb collaborating with Quixote. 

This is the Del Mar Wine + Food Festival—one of SoCal’s premiere food and drink events showcasing the unique culinary experiences infused with San Diego’s fitness and wellness culture. If you’re heading to the fest this year, we put together an insider’s guide to all the standout activations at the Grand Tasting taking place from September 13 & 14. Here’s what not to miss:

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Sips, Tastings & Photo-Ops

Across Saturday and Sunday, festival-goers can wander the grounds to enjoy activations from sponsors like LaCroix, Landmark Vineyards, Justin Wines, and Clink. These pop-ups will be offering food and drink tastings, goodie-bags, and little surprises that make wandering the festival half the fun.

Clink will be pouring a mix of wines in the picnic area just outside the VIP tent, while Justin, Landmark, and Lewis wines will host tastings nearby. Heaven Hill Tequila Ocho and Mezcal Vago, will be outside the beach area near Feeding San Diego, and LaCroix will be available throughout the grounds with sparkling water and an Instagram-worthy floral photo-op near the Locals zone. 

You can also catch San Simeon wines outside the VIP tent, Spritz in the beach area, Peroni and Blue Moon outside VIP, The Grill Dads throwing tailgate-style parties with Grillin’ Time canned cocktails flowing from branded coolers, and The Los Angeles Golf Club Dryvebox giving everyone the chance to test their swing on a golf simulator. Follow your taste buds, your camera, or your curiosity and you’re guaranteed to run into something worthy of a pause at every turn.

Exclusive Chef Collabs

Chef collabs at the Del Mar Wine + Food fest mix flavor, personalities, and a little bit of culinary chaos in the best way. After all, how often do you catch two acclaimed talents sharing the same space? On Saturday, Jackson Kalb teams up with Quixote, while Jet Tila links with Serea and Lionfish for a full-on takeover of the Culinary Comp Zone. Both days feature Fox Point partnering with Haven’s Mawa McQueen in the VIP area, while Plant Paradise joins forces with Nichols Farms and chef Zuliya Khawaja. 

And this is just some of many prime celebrity-spotting opportunities. Your favorite chefs will be sprinkled all across the weekend’s lineup. Get the full lowdown on where to find them here. 

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Local Bites & Cooking Demonstrations 

Beyond the zones, the weekend features some of the best SoCal names in the food and drink industry including A+M Catering, Amalfi Cucina Italiana, Quixote, Glass Box, Rosemarie’s Buns & Brews, Bianchi Winery, Rootdown Wine Cellars, and more. Saturday brings the star power of STK Steakhouse, Jake’s Del Mar, ARLO San Diego, and Provisional Kitchen, while Sunday turns the spotlight to Lana Restaurant, Waverly, Flame & Flavor, and Seasons 52. Click here to see the full list of participating restaurants.

Kyoku Knives will also make its mark as a headline sponsor throughout the festival, with chef Jeff Roberto breaking down sushi, sashimi, and Wagyu beef during the Sushi on a Roll activation in the VIP Reception Area. He’ll be joined by Brian Malarkey (Top Chef, Herb & Wood, Animae) and Tommy “The Fishmonger” Gomes (Outdoor Channel) so be sure to get your cameras ready. 

Games, DJs & Tailgates

Field games and foodie finds galore, throughout the weekend, attendees can catch some wiffle ball and classic ballpark eats at Ballpark in the Park, dive into a soccer experience with San Diego Wave FC or join tailgate enthusiasts with SDFC and DirecTV. Or, keep the celebration going with DJs spinning at the Mountain experience.

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At Street Fleet Alley, find local food trucks and street food pop-ups serving their best fare. Plus, this year, Baja and Paso Robles head to San Diego to showcase their local breweries, restaurants, and lifestyle brands—keep an eye out for their activations. 

Everywhere you turn, you’ll find art installations, local food, celebrity chefs, TV personalities, and unique pop-ups. It’s what the Grand Tasting is all about: living your best life, one sip, bite, and beat at a time.

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Eat & Drink

San Marcos has a variety of delectable dining options conveniently located downtown in Old California Restaurant Row. This Spanish-style plaza houses a dozen chain and regional restaurants, many of which are open for outdoor dining, including mainstay Fish House Vera Cruz, gold-rush-inspired Old California Mining Company, and North County’s first microbrewery, San Marcos Brewery & Grill. Just up the street you’ll find Mama Kat’s. This charming café named for the owner’s mother offers breakfast favorites, specialty coffees, pastries, and pies.

Fish House Vera Cruz

Justin Halbert

San Marcos has some tasty drink options, too. Meadiocrity’s sweet honey wine supports local beekeepers and helps hives thrive. Visitors to Sunshine Mountain Vineyard can enjoy its varietals on a patio overlooking the lush, rolling hillsides.

Antique Village

Justin Halbert

Shop

Tucked amid the warehouses and showrooms along Furniture Row is Antique Village, a one-stop shop for vintage jewelry, collectibles, coins, china, toys, memorabilia, and more from over 60 vendors. San Marcos also caters to crafters and creators with stores like Yarning for You, Grand Country Quilters, Quilt in a Day, and Discount Hobby.

Double Peak

Justin Halbert

Play

Affectionately known as “San Parkos,” this city is blanketed with green space and trails for hiking, biking, and horseback riding. Double Peak, accessible via scenic Discovery Lake, is one of the most popular treks. At the top of this 1,000-foot climb in the San Elijo Hills, hikers are treated to views stretching from the mountains to the sea. Not a hiker? Not a problem. There are plenty of outdoor options for you, too. Head to Lake San Marcos for a day on the water. Lakehouse Hotel & Resort rents motorboats to cruise along the calm waters, and you can even explore the lake by gondola by booking an advance tour with The Black Swan Gondola Company. End the day with a cold one at Decoy Dockside, the resort’s restaurant, which has two spacious decks.

Discovery Lake

Bonus!

Nearby Elfin Forest is a hiker’s paradise and Halloween-lover’s delight. Legend has it that shadowy apparitions, a wicked witch, and a ghostly woman in white roam this rugged reserve after dark. However, after-hours visits are strictly off-limits for a dangerous practical reason: Mountain lions and the other wildlife who call the reserve home need to do what they do undisturbed.

Mama Kat’s

Justin Halbert

1949 Boat Houses San Diego Magazine

Consider it a glossy version of scrapbooking. We’re getting wistful over how many times North County has graced our pages over our 75-year tenure serving this city—and we should be.

In digging through the annals of SDM history, we’ve found that North County has been cropping up since the beginning. In 1949, we featured a couple who owned homes in Encinitas constructed to look like boats, but not seaworthy in the slightest. This was the first of many profiles that cemented North County as the county’s leader in design.

Through the ’50s, ads were placed beckoning our readers to dine with the likes of Bing Crosby in the racetrack- adjacent town of Del Mar. The ’70s saw North County open up as a leisure and entertainment destination, promoting townhome living and new restaurants, which parallels its current cultural climate. The issues of the ’80s and ’90s brought more of North County as the region itself grew in population and economic appeal.

As we wax this North County nostalgia on the page, take in these snippets of the past knowing that we are focused on including every inch of this county, which is why we dedicate an issue to this sprawling swath of culture—that just so happens to have a pretty amazing view.

Homes That Aren’t Houses, 1949

It must be the coastal breeze that makes every North County resident a little bit of a skipper. And in 1949, they might have worn those dapper nautical hats, too. But we’re not talking house boats bobbing along the bay. We’re talking a hull as a full-on house on dry, Encinitas land, as owned by the eccentric and aquatic Mr. & Mrs. Aden D. Gilder.

Cantina La Tienda, 1951

1951 Cantina La Tienda San Diego Magazine Ad

Thought Golden Hill was the destination for indoor BBQing and icy martinis? Think again. The original home of the Turf Club was, in fact, Del Mar. Catntina La Tienda, a Mexican Restaurant owned by Bing Crosby, was the first iteration of the space. But after a move across the highway, it was rebranded as the Turf Club. In 1982, we highlighted the rise of the dining scene in Del Mar, which included this much loved spot as a 24-hour eatery—where racetrack folk could still get an “eye-opener” from the bar at 6 a.m. if the mood, or need, should strike.

Rancho California, 1966

1966 Land Barons San Diego Magazine Ad

Let’s face it—some of our archival ads celebrate societal shortcomings rather than countering them. “Land baron” doesn’t quite have the same ring to it these days, but, in 1966, Rancho California promoted the chance to start your North County inland dynasty.

County Road, North County, 1968

1968 2 Kids Country Road San Diego Magazine

This isn’t the first time we’ve looked back. For SDM’s 20th anniversary, the editors ran a selection of archival pics, including this charming shot of NoCo tots.

Del Mar Restaurants, 1972

1972 Del Mar San Diego Magazine

In 1972, Del Mar had a restaurant boom with five new eateries along its coast. Highlighted in this issue were The Turf Club, a Catholic- church-turned-restaurant called Albatross, GRB (The Golden Rollin Belly, of course), Firepit, and the recently shuttered Bully’s North.

Pacific Villas at Rancho La Costa, 1976

1976 Pacific Villas San Diego Magazine Ad

Not a quite condo, not yet a mansion. This dream of middle-class living was alive and well in 1976. The groovy thing? They’re still around and in demand. Have your own 1,442-square-foot slice of the ’70s for just shy of an estimated $800K.

San Diego in The Xtreme, 1997

1997 X-games San Diego Magazine

If our embedded skateboarding culture wasn’t a big enough draw, maybe the backdrop of Oceanside sealed the deal. Back in 1997, we chronicled the athletes and North County spectators who flocked to see the extreme in action at the third annual X Games, where last month’s cover star and North County resident, Tony Hawk, took home the gold for a “perfect run” in the Skateboard Vert with a score of 97.5.

KKOS 96 FM Radio, 1981

1981 KKOS 96FM San Diego Magazine Ad

In its ’80s heyday, this Carlsbad airwaver played the pop gamut, from Adult Contemporary to Top 40, on its 95.9 dial. They were also, apparently, pretty cozy with easy listening’s adult beverage of choice. We can imagine it now: Slathering on Zinka and cracking a brew on South Ponto Beach with our transistor on in the background. This J. Geils Band anthem’s for you, North County.

There’s A Lot of Theres There, 1997

1997 North County San Diego Magazine

Tell us something we don’t know. Deep diving into the upper regions of our county, writer Tom Blair extolled the virtues of each little pocket, from Del Martians and their cigarette smoke ban (progress for the era) to the leisure of frou- frou blended libations and polo in Rancho Santa Fe and the migrant workers living in nearby Escondido. Shoutout Gertrude Stein.

Rhino Boom, 1997

1997 Baby Rhino San Diego Magazine

Forget Romper Room—in 1997 it was “Rhino Boom” in Escondido with four newborn Indian rhinoceroses arriving at the San Diego Wild Animal Park that November. Much like the recent condor birth at the park, this was a big deal. Constantly upholding zoological excellence, the Wild Animal Safari Park is a long-standing staple of North County education and culture.

Legomania, 1999

1999 Legoland San Diego Magazine

The Danish seem to do everything right. Between pastries, their status as one of the top three happiest countries in the world, and the Lego (Danish for “play well”) company selecting Carlsbad as their third theme park location, they are slowly winning our allegiance. Writer Rob Akins hyped up this great plastic hope as a way to bring jobs and tourism to this agrarian enclave of San Diego.

Hot Topic, daycare for hardcores.

My daughter and her preteen friends hang out at Target. Not to go shopping; they just walk its aisles in herds, cruise the place, look for other groups of preteens. Maybe get trinkets. The big red bullseye has become their social space. They will come of age right next to the shampoo and the affordable clothes and the TP.

I can’t tell you how sad this makes me. These kids have tech that makes Atari game systems look like cave paintings from the Mr. Belvedere era. Plenty of diseases have been eradicated or tamed for them. But their third places really, really suck.

For those unfamiliar with the term, a third place—coined by sociologist Ray Oldenburg—means a separate space just to be other than home and work or, in the case of these kids, school. Good hangout spots, Oldenburg wrote in 1989, are “the people’s own remedy for stress, loneliness, and alienation.” They’re “gathering places where community is most alive and people are most themselves.”

Target, while a quality retailer, is not much of a third place. It’s a place you go to get the cream that will undo the rash, the place for bed sheets and starter electronics and birthday toys for kids you don’t really know.

And these 11-year-old girls choose to go hang there. They do laps, gossiping and pointing and laughing and exploring the world through the lens of a highly successful and functional mass-market retailer. Granted, it has a Starbucks. (My daughter has made it clear that this Starbucks is not the real thing, that the drinks taste watered down or like an off-brand extension.) But still, I can’t help but feel that this really blows.

This is all due to the death of the American mall and other factors that could take up another essay in a different issue. Because up until the 2000s, we had the whole Fast Times at Ridgemont High experience in suburban San Diego thanks to the indoor wonderland known as North County Fair.

Our buddy Oldenburg argued that true third places exist “outside the cash nexus.” But for junior highers with about 10 dollars of babysitting money to our names, the mall was exactly that—just a self-contained, relatively safe place where we could all stumble through puberty as a publicly shared spectacle.

Where we could learn the ropes of group socialization outside of a school setting. School socializations is not like after-school socializations. In school, you’re allotted specific times and breaks and sent to a single uninspired area with a little free time between snacks and lunch to contemplate preteen-ness with cohorts in that terrifying journey.

In malls, there is no preordained order to things, just a bunch of wild lights and a multitude of new impulses and stimuli you must learn to navigate together on the fly. (Also, maybe an arcade.)

We’d wander its long, highly illuminated gallery of shops and learn about what adults like, what we might like as we got older and aged and weird shit started happening to our bodies and brains and souls. We’d walk through Nordstrom to find out what rich people wore. We’d giggle at the Victoria’s Secret store. We’d get exposed to kicks culture at the shoe store. The food court was where we’d get our first taste of multicultural cuisine—Belgian fries, almost-Chinese fast food, you name it. At the nauseatingly odorous store, we’d wonder what kind of extra-dry humans need all this lotion.

“Get in loser, we’re going shopping.”

The mall was like a massive, incredibly diverse, neon curio of capitalism. Even if capitalism is late-stage and all the cool kids are leaning toward socialism these days, the old market-driven society still governs. The mall was bumper bowling for adolescence. We could observe herd mentality; peruse the current desirable objects of life in capitalistic culture; and discuss, gawk, commune, and learn to navigate the sociological milieu that, within seven years or so, we’d be forced to contend with on our own.

And because it was so massive, the mall gave us SPACE to get lost, wander, make mistakes, tell secrets, harmlessly make out, or get rejected in somewhat private… It was the magical third place for American preteens and teens.

And now that’s been reduced to a single, big-box retailer best known for cleaning supplies and blenders. Jeff Bezos failed my daughter and a hundred million American teens, and he should feel compelled to write a formal apology on Medium.

But! This is all changing. The American mall is coming back! UTC Westfield has become its own city, many of its retailers giving way to restaurants, bars, activity spaces (like bowling and go-karts), and places that offer sociability, group activities, and interactive humaning—something we’re all missing.

You go there on the weekends now and it’s packed again, thriving. And to my point, its public relations team asked that we refer to it as a “center,” rather than a “mall,” because Westfield sees itself as more of a “lifestyle destination.”

And they’re not alone. One Paseo is like its own Cape Cod-ian village; across the street, Del Mar Highlands is like Fast Times for the breathwork crowd; Westfield Mission Valley is the pre-movie social race track.

And now, they’re remaking North County Mall in Escondido, formerly known as my beloved North County Fair. Allegedly, and keeping with this nouveau mall formula, it’ll have stronger retailers and more entertainment options, like new restaurants and possibly a movie theater.

I realize they can’t make it exclusively for preteens and teenagers, because those kinds of humans are broke, and that’s a terrible business model. But they really should consider the preteen and teen, and make it a safe, invigorating place for them—a well-designed bazaar of essential and discretionary choices for their future income. A glimpse into the desires of the fully formed, capitalist adult citizen.

A place better than Target. No disrespect to Tarzjhaay. I quite honestly doubt the benevolent overlords common daily needs even wanted this. They’re just serving as an involuntary nanny for our kids because Bezos killed the mall.

Well, now, you son of a bitch, the mall is back. You can gobble up all the retail sales, you can own three-quarters of the world, but you underestimated our innate need to walk around in a group and awkwardly become human together.