Alta Mesa, Monterey, CA

Most of Monterey grew street by street, but Alta Mesa was planned. Three Jacks sisters hired the Olmsted Brothers in the mid-1920s to lay it out, so the roads follow the contours of the mesa south of downtown instead of a grid. Del Monte Center and Monterey Peninsula College sit at its edges. Spanish Colonial and Monterey Revival houses from the 1920s share the hillside with a few early adobes, and many lots back onto parkland. La Mirada, a restored adobe with a garden by landscape architect Florence Yoch, now belongs to the Monterey Museum of Art and hosts its events. Belts of coast live oak and Monterey pine, part of the original design, still screen the streets. Two planted greenways wrap the perimeter. Iris Canyon Greenbelt Park and Don Dahvee Park were donated to the city and give the edges their wooded look. On the north side, El Estero Park adds a lake, a dog park and, along Pearl Street, the Dennis the Menace Playground. Eating here centers on the Munras Avenue plaza. The Wild Plum Cafe, at 731B Munras, serves breakfast, lunch and dinner from a counter and has outdoor seating, and Krua Thai shares the address. Over at El Estero, the snack bar on Pearl Street sells burgers and hot dogs with seats outside. For coffee and a pastry, Alta Bakery + Café, inside the historic Cooper-Molera Adobe, is a few minutes toward Old Town and known for its lavender oat milk latte. Daily errands run through Del Monte Center, where Whole Foods Market anchors the grocery side. Munras Avenue is the usual route down to downtown, and Highway 1 is close. The winding layout that makes Alta Mesa pretty also makes straight-line trips awkward, and with this much slope a walk home usually ends uphill. From inside, the old planting plan still works, because a college, a shopping center and a busy avenue are all close by and the oaks and pines hide every one of them.