Hey there,
If you found us through one of our short films about San Diego’s old scandals and forgotten fortunes — welcome. That’s the spirit of this whole thing: the city underneath the postcard. Every week we send the notes we’d give a friend who just moved here and wanted to know what’s actually worth knowing.
Here’s your first edition.
Walk the cliffs above La Jolla Cove and you’ll pass a little shop with a tunnel inside it. In the early 1900s, a developer paid laborers to hand-carve a 145-step passage straight down through the sandstone to a hidden sea cave below — Sunny Jim Cave, named for its profile. It’s the only land entrance to a sea cave on the California coast, and most people who drive past have no idea it’s there.
That’s the kind of thing we love: the detail hiding in plain sight. Some weeks it’s a curiosity like this. Some weeks — like our films — it’s a story with a body count of bank accounts.
Three neighborhoods worth a second look
Barrio Logan. Under the Coronado bridge, Chicano Park holds the largest collection of outdoor murals in the country. Go for the art, stay for the coffee and the panaderías along Logan Avenue.
North Park. The 30th Street corridor is still the best easy night out in the city — independent kitchens, old neon, and a walkable stretch where you can leave the car for the whole evening.
Point Loma. Drive out to the tip at Cabrillo for the tide pools at low tide and the view back across the bay that reminds you why people don’t leave once they get here.
One insider tip
Balboa Park is free to wander, but the museums rotate free admission for San Diego county residents on a schedule through the year. Bring proof of residency and you can see a different museum most weeks without paying a dime. Locals forget this; tourists never knew.
A gift from our sponsor
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What’s next
Next week: a neighborhood that reinvented itself twice, the new restaurant we keep going back to, and another story from the city’s stranger files. If there’s something you want us to dig into, just reply — I read every one.
— The San Diego Lifestyle Guide Team