Spring Valley, CA

Spring Valley is an unincorporated East County community in San Diego County, spread over the hills between La Presa, Lemon Grove, La Mesa and Casa de Oro-Mount Helix. Its edges blur. La Presa was counted as part of it until 1990, and homes there and in parts of Casa de Oro still carry Spring Valley addresses in the 91977 and 91978 ZIP codes. Water explains the name. Kumeyaay people lived near a natural spring here long before Spanish ranchers arrived and named it St. George's Spring. In 1863 Judge Augustus Ensworth claimed the land around it and built a small adobe. Historian Hubert Howe Bancroft later bought the ranch and experimented with olives, citrus and almonds. In the 1890s a stop on the San Diego and Cuyamaca Eastern Railroad helped draw settlers, and suburban growth followed the water and the terrain after the war. Housing today runs from postwar ranch houses and hillside split levels to newer two-story tracts and townhomes, with larger semi-rural lots in a few canyons. The terrain does a lot of the sorting, and the views improve the higher a street climbs. The outdoors run east along the Sweetwater River. The Sweetwater River Trail follows the river corridor at the community's eastern edge, and Hollenbeck Canyon Wildlife Area opens up just beyond it off Campo Road for longer hikes. Campo Road, just over the line in Casa de Oro, is where a lot of everyday eating and shopping happens. Sunrise Deli, where Campo meets North Barcelona Street, is a morning stop for sandwiches made early. The Spring Valley Library on Kempton Street and the busiest shopping strips along Sweetwater Road and Jamacha Boulevard technically sit in La Presa. That split is the main frustration. With no city government and its commercial center counted in a neighboring census area, the community has no single downtown, and civic decisions run through the county. What holds the place together is the name itself, carried on mailing addresses, Little League jerseys and school signs across a much wider area than any map line.