Aviara, Carlsbad, CA

Aviara spreads across the hills above Batiquitos Lagoon in south Carlsbad, a planned community laid out around an Arnold Palmer golf course and a resort hotel. Development began in 1989, and the hillsides filled in through the early and middle 1990s. Homes are mostly two stories, with some single-story plans, and many follow a Spanish look with clay tile roofs. Many of the enclaves are gated, and views of the lagoon, the fairways or the ocean show up from a lot of back patios. Apart from the Mirabella condos, the community was planned without apartments, and its associations keep strict rules on how things look. The trail network is the everyday draw. About six miles of dirt paths wind through the neighborhood, from the short Golf View Trail off Ambrosia Lane to the Eucalyptus Trail, a steep climb of a bit over a mile that tops out with water views. The Lagoon Trail follows the north shore of Batiquitos for a little over two miles, with signs about the plants and the egrets and herons that winter there. Aviara Community Park on Ambrosia Lane has ball fields, basketball courts, a playground and picnic shelters, and doubles as trail parking. Park Hyatt Aviara, which ran as a Four Seasons until 2010, sits above the lagoon with the golf club, the Vivace dining room and a pool bar and grill. Day to day, most errands in Aviara end at the shopping center on El Camino Real at the east edge. La Costa Coffee Roasting at 6965 roasts organic beans and puts on live music on its patio, and Beach Plum Kitchen next door does New England style breakfasts with homemade jams until 2 in the afternoon. That same center has a Vons, so groceries are close to home for the east side. The city library branch on Dove Lane is inside the neighborhood, along with two public schools. Most trips start in a car on Poinsettia Lane or Palomar Airport Road, and the Poinsettia Coaster station sits near the freeway to the west. Everything is spread out over steep ground, and the gates and design rules that keep the place looking uniform also make spontaneous changes to a house harder. From the upper streets at dusk, the lagoon turns silver below the fairways, and that view is the reason the hills were built the way they were.