Country Club Heights, Pacific Grove, CA

Country Club Heights is a residential pocket of Pacific Grove beside the Country Club Gate shopping center, a short way from the 17-Mile Drive gate. The streets are mostly houses with little through traffic, and the commercial strip is near enough that a coffee run takes a couple of minutes. Homes here are single-family houses on moderate lots, set under pines and trimmed hedges. Pines shade many of the driveways, and fog settles into the yards most mornings. Driveways and small yards are the norm, a different look from the older cottages packed along the grid downtown. Outdoors, Rip Van Winkle Open Space, the narrow woodland strip on Country Club Gate, is the closest trail and works as a daily route for walkers. Asilomar State Beach and its dune path take a quick drive, and Lovers Point and the coastal trail lie a little farther along the bay. For food, Michael's Taqueria, down on Forest Avenue, serves Mexican plates with Cajun and Texas touches, and Patisserie Bechler sells French and Alsatian cakes and pastries a few doors along. The Bagel Bakery in the Country Club Gate center covers breakfast, with a Starbucks and a Jersey Mike's in the same cluster for quick lunches. A Trader Joe's and a Safeway share the same stretch of Forest Avenue, the nearest groceries and a short drive away. Forest Avenue is the main road out, running toward downtown Lighthouse Avenue and the Highway 1 connection, and both are a few minutes by car. Daily life in Country Club Heights follows a pattern of short drives. Almost everything is close but not quite close enough to carry bags home on foot, so the car gets daily use, and parking at the shopping center is never a problem. The streets themselves stay calm, and the nearest bakery is a quick trip.