Sure why it was brought up, but also one that I have some pretty strong feelings about.

First off, I have lived in Mission Viejo, Coto and now between Coto and Ladera Ranch. I have lived in this area since I was a kid and started to frequent San Clemente on a regular basis to surf when I was in 6-7th grade. We use to take the 91 bus route from MV and drop us off at the pier, at least 2-4 times a week in the summer. I continued to surf and visit different areas of SC from Churches to North Beach (204s) to this day. We (my wife and I) favor the area from the pier to state park. I still surf Trestles, but she doesn’t go, as it is a 1-2 mile walk.

I guess the reason I have such strong feelings about SC is not only my history there, but what it is to people not of this area and what we don’t want it to become.

First of all, all the little references to a few restaurants are nice, but this really has very little to do with the community and over all reputation.

The reason SC is pretty unique is because it is the furthest south OC that you can go, and then there is the military base for a long stretch and then Oceanside. This puts SC on or very close to the coast (Not all communities are on the water), but the thing that makes it a bit different than say Newport, Laguna, Huntington, etc, is the lack of population. The community is a lot more quiet than the large beach cities and this is where things get interesting that outsiders don’t really see, everyone that lives locally, want to KEEP it that way!!!! The larger beach cities have had a lot of development, residential, commercial, hotels, shops, chain restaurants, etc.... what this does for the locals, is it not only brings in more tourists, but is crowds everything and it takes away what makes south OC (and north SD) unique.

There is already development happening that really ticks off the locals and this has been taking place for the last 10-15 years. Imagine it like this. You bought a small beach house in 1978 that overlooked the water and you purposely moved there to stay away from huge cities and for the view. Now imagine 41 years later you or your kids live in the same spot and some bug time business guy from China or even an American buys the house just below you. The next step is that they tear down the house and over the next several months they build a huge 3 story 6,000 ft home that has not only taken away your quiet and peaceful life with the construction going on, but now you have no view of the ocean!!! Not only that, chances are pretty high that the new owner is only in the home a few months out of the year, and either leaves it dormant or rents it out to visitors (and the visitors and the new owners have very little care or interest in the community as a whole). How does this make you feel?

There is other stuff that people hate as well for the most part, the area of Talega is where a lot of the new growth has taken place. This is a beautiful and well kept planned community (much like Ladera ranch but even better since it is more spread out and closer to the coast). It is further east and although it has a mailing address of San Clemente, many of the long time SC people HATE the fact that it is there and want nothing to do with it. Why? Well, again, the vast majority of the people that live there aren’t from SC or surrounding communities and many are from out of the area or out of state, which brings a totally different vibe to the area. In other words, someone moves there from Utah, buys a wave storm surfboard from Costco and will throw a license plate from on their black Escalade that reads “id rather be surfing” or “San clemente, the best climate in the world” yet to the real SC people at the surfers, they are total kooks. The other thing is that they don’t even realize it, they think they are really part of the “scene”.

But why do the old SC feel this way about these kind of things? They don’t want to see it become like the other big beach cities mentioned about. They want to keep it a small, slow beach town and keep it what it is (which ironically, is what makes it so attractive to so many people, and that’s the problem). The other problem that was created by this development is that now the kids that live in Talega go to San Clemente HS, while some of the older SC families and homes got moved over to go to a new San Juan Hills HS that is not only further away, but they want nothing to do with, since their whole family has gone to SCHS. This actually got much better just over a year ago as they built another road that connect Talega to San Juan, so some of this has switched back, but the feelings are still there.

So my advice is that if you move to the area, either SC or near by, or visit the area. Don’t act like you think your a local and expect everyone to take you seriously. Just chill, be respectful, low key, respect the people, respect the beach, respect the culture. This is the case for all beach towns, especially the small ones like SC as well as many in Hawaii.

The other interesting thing about SC is that it is actually the lowest income city in all of OC. How is that? Well, like most beach cities, there is a fairly high homeless population that live near the beach or the railroad tracks. On top of that, there is a relatively high number of military personnel that live there, as well as many young people renting rooms, condos or apartments close to the beach.

So the make up of the city is kind of interesting. You have
1. Old time SC families that mostly live further south, either live close to the beach or huge homes built in 80-90s just east of the freeway. Most of these are against the new neighborhoods and have deep roots in the city.

2. Young military guys that are not from any beach community, come and go often and are kind of “outsiders” since they aren’t stationed there long, but they still are population in the city and contribute to commerce.

3. The younger, mostly single people. These people are usually from SC or surrounding areas. They want to be in SC because it’s mellow and near the beach. They typically live in apartments, condos, or rent rooms in the area around the pier and north, all the way to North Beach. They usually respect the city more because they want to keep it what it is, but they party a ton and it can get pretty crazy.

4. Homeless near pier or tracks

5. The tourists. Yes, there are tourists there all year, but it is the worst in the summer. Tons of people from Az, Utah, Colorado, mid west, etc. (is say most of them are from Utah and Az and many of them are LDS).

6. Talegans. The new inlander SC people that usually upper middle class+, usually come from surrounding states, but not necessarily surrounding areas (which goes back to, if you grew up in SC, you are kind of against the whole thing). But this is slowly changing as sometimes the locals have wanted to move into a bigger or nicer home and realize it’s kind of stupid to not move there based on the stereotypes. (There is very limited housing in SC). The ones that are despised the most are the example I gave above, the ones that are really into image of having money, professional, yet also not having any history or understanding of the beach scene, but at the same time want to look like they really are Beach people and Beverly Hills “light” people at the same time. It just doesn’t mesh with the locals well. Ironically, I identify more with this crowd in the area I live, but also really understand the local vibe as well since I’ve been here so long, so I don’t get harassed by locals, etc.

I guess another big problem that we see is that say your a family in Utah and all of the sudden you start making over 1/4 mil a year and you move to Talega. You drive a BMW or Merc, wife drives an Escalade or Denali or Land Rover (or if your a bit more humble, a Honda Odyssey). Since you are moving up in the world, you start to think you might be a little bit better than you are and now you live in a cool area of OC and get a little bit of an entitlement thing going on. The problem with This is a few things. 1. Everyone that lives around you probably makes similar money, so don’t act like you are special. 2. The locals have never been about money, in fact they kind of don’t like it because of the attitudes it brings and the development and some people just don’t care, they want to be on the beach in a small home, away from the “jones’s“. 3. Of the people that aren’t new California move ins from out of the area aren’t impressed either. There has been money in south OC way before you got here, so even if it might be new to you, it isn’t new to anyone else. Yes, these are issues that most nice and new communities deal with, but for some reason the fact that you add the beach scene and history into it as well as many out of state imports, it can create even harder feelings (and most of the move ins don’t even know it).

Also, there are some things that you will see in SC that are all about keeping people out. All the stickers and signs that say “stop the toll road”. Everyone likes to act like this is because of the Indian burial grounds, the enviro, etc, etc. the reality is, no one here wants to roll road to dump off in SC because we don’t want all the 909 and 951 rifraff coming to SC instead of huntington. Yes, we don’t want a bunch of bro-hoes coming to SC and making all agro, hyper, and more drugs, more drinking and more fights and esp with non-beach people (there is already drugs and alch as any beach city seems to have, but they don’t want it to get worse). In other words, if it is hard to get to SC the inlanders will be much much less likely to come and ruin the beach culture.

A few tips when visiting the beach. 1.Don’t yell or scream at each other or your kids. People are there to relax
2.give people space and be careful when setting up your spot directly in front of other people (esp with large families, umbrellas, tents, etc) that are facing the beach, they want the view and the tide might be coming up, so you can’t expect them to keep moving back because you didn’t know.
3.dont smoke on the beach
4.dont let your kids get in sand fights (it hits other people and really pisses people off)
5.dont skip rocks on the water unless there is absolutely NO body near the weather.
6. If your going to throw frisbees make sure you are far away from everyone!!
7. Don’t try and sneak your dog onto the beach.
8. Leave the attitude somewhere else
9. Related to 8, leave the stress and loud voices somewhere else. For example-We don’t want a huge group coming down and taking their beach chairs and umbrellas out of the new wrappers from Costco only to hear the pissed off dad yelling and screaming trying to find something that someone forgot at the car.
10. Pick up your trash!!

Anyway. I am sure there are lots of misspellings and errors because it’s late, but those are some thoughts regarding an area that I love and want to keep it that way 😉