Rancho Peñasquitos, San Diego, CA

Rancho Peñasquitos, which almost everyone shortens to PQ, is named for Rancho Santa Maria de Los Peñasquitos, which in 1823 became the county's earliest Mexican-era land grant. The ranch kept operating until 1962, when Irvin Kahn purchased some 14,000 acres for a new suburb, and two years later San Diego brought most of it inside the city limits. Homes in Rancho Peñasquitos reflect that long build-out, with tracts added decade by decade from the 1960s on as the suburb filled the hills between the canyon and the mountain. Most of it is single-family housing, and Christmas Card Lane has been a December tradition here since 1982. Two big open spaces frame the neighborhood. Los Peñasquitos Canyon, a preserve the city and county share and which covers roughly 4,000 acres, runs some seven miles along the southern edge with hiking, biking and horse trails, and the Canyonside rec center and ballfields sit on the preserve's edge. Black Mountain, the high point at about 1,500 feet, rises on the north side, and its open space park has a Hilltop entrance on the PQ side. Closer in, there are neighborhood parks like Peñasquitos Creek, Rolling Hills and Twin Trails, plus a skate park on Carmel Mountain Road. Most eating happens in the Black Mountain Road centers. Knotty Barrel pours a long craft beer list and is known for the Knotty Burger. A few doors down, The Deli Stop has been a local hangout for decades, with grilled subs, 16 taps and an arcade in the back, and the PQ outpost of Sab-E-Lee cooks northeastern Thai dishes like namtok and rates its heat on a scale that tops out at ten. Vons on Black Mountain Road and Stater Bros. on Carmel Mountain Road cover groceries, and the library sits on Salmon River Road. State Route 56 cuts east to west through the middle, I-15 marks the eastern line, and the Rapid 235 bus runs downtown from the Sabre Springs and Peñasquitos transit station. PQ is spread out, and nearly every trip involves a car. Still, both the seven-mile canyon and Black Mountain can be reached on local streets, with no freeway involved.