Friday, April 11, 2014

Leucadia - The Beach Community That California Forgot

By Carlos Hunnefeld


Leucadia is a funky beachside community within the little South California beach town of Encinitas. Once a hippie heaven, remnants of the 1960's are still in evidence throughout this north San Diego community. Here you will find wooden cigar store Indians, tie-dye T-shirts, weird lawn art, cool love beads and surfboard mailboxes.

Leucadia was settled by English spiritualists in 1870 and named islands in Greece. Many of its streets are named after Greek mythological figures. Once primarily agricultural (the Poinsettia Capitol Of The World) many of the former flower-growing businesses are now gone.

Leucadia is home to Italian restaurants, funky shops, yoga studios, palm readers and cool art galleries. Local hangouts include Pannikin Coffee & Tea, a former 1880s train station much favored by the arts crowd; world-famous Lou's Records housing an enormous collection of new and used CDs and records; and Karina's Taco Shop, home of the best Shrimp Burritos on earth.

Leucadia's residents say that the best thing that ever happened to Leucadia was that nothing ever happened to it. Leucadia's beaches are lost in the 1960s and are old neighborhood surf breaks where hundreds of Leucadian's have been surfing for thirty or more years. There are four especially popular surf beaches - Moonlight, Grandview, Beacon's and Stone Steps - all are hidden treasures.

Fitness enthusiasts can get a daily workout at Stone Steps Beach where a 97 step staircase lead down from the bluff top to the sandy beach; all along the workout you have phenomenal views of the ocean while you get fit. When it's high tide, the ocean comes right to the stairs - at low tide the beach is sandy and wide.

If you want to learn to surf, you can take a lesson or two from the one and only Kahuna Bob, an icon in Leucadia - just Google Kahuna Bob. Dolphins and whales are regularly seen. And it you look closely on a clear sunset, you will see the "green flash" as the sun sets behind the Pacific Ocean.

Moonlight Beach is often called "the beach with everything" because it has lifeguard towers, a children's playground, big parking lots, play areas, fire-rings, showers, restrooms, beach rentals and a snack bar... and, of course... a wide sandy beach!




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