Old Coach, Poway, CA

Old Coach covers Poway's northern reach, the big wedge of oak canyons, golf fairways and estate lots east of Espola Road that runs up to the San Dieguito River country. A large share of the city's open land is here, and much of it is protected, with Lake Poway and the Blue Sky Ecological Reserve both inside the boundary. Homes come in a few distinct flavors. Old Coach Golf Estates laid out about 156 one-acre sites around the Maderas Golf Club, an 18-hole course designed by Johnny Miller, and the guard-gated Heritage Custom Estates and The Heritage add larger custom houses with fairway views. In Valle Verde Country Club Estates along Saint Andrews Drive, single-story homes from the 1970s sit on rolling streets, and Stonebridge Chateaus offers single-level townhomes with a shared pool. Any increase in density in the Old Coach planned area needs a citywide vote. Trails are what people use most. Blue Sky Ecological Reserve, 770 acres off Espola Road, has a shaded, wide first mile that is easy enough for a slow Sunday walk, then climbs to Lake Ramona. Lake Poway has a trail that circles the water for nearly five miles, plus shoreline fishing and warm-weather campouts, and the Old Coach Trail runs more than five miles through oak woodland to the city limit and the Coast to Crest Trail. Valle Verde Neighborhood Park handles the smaller outings. Eating out leans toward the edges. Bernardo Winery, at the western edge with a Rancho Bernardo address, has made wine since 1889 and has been in the Rizzo family since 1927, and its courtyard holds Manzanita Roasting's coffee house, small shops and a Friday morning farmers market. The Lookout at Lake Poway serves avocado toast and paninis on a patio where bald eagles sometimes show up. Daily life runs on Espola Road. Groceries, pharmacies and most restaurants are a drive south into central Poway or west into Rancho Bernardo, and Interstate 15 is reached the same way. Walking to a store is not realistic from most streets. Privacy and acreage come at the cost of distance. Even a gallon of milk means a car trip, and every supermarket sits outside the boundary. On weekend mornings the Blue Sky trail and the lake loop do the job a town square would do elsewhere, and neighbors tend to run into each other there first.