Santa Rosa

Santa Rosa

Santa Rosa is the gateway to Sonoma wine country, less polished than Napa but more lived-in. Charles Schulz lived here and the Snoopy museum is a delight. The Russian River redwoods are 30 minutes west. The city itself has rebuilt impressively after the 2017 fires, with a downtown that mixes wineries, breweries, and farm-to-table restaurants. Cooler than San Francisco in summer.

Riverside

Riverside is where the navel orange got its start in America, with the parent tree from 1873 still alive and producing fruit on a downtown corner. The Mission Inn is a wildly ornate Spanish Revival hotel that hosts the country's biggest holiday lights festival. Riverside's downtown is genuinely walkable, with citrus groves still scattered through the foothills. Summers are dry and bright, with the foothills cooling the evenings.