Santa Monica Ca

The Santa Monica Pico farmers market on Saturdays has a lower profile than the big Wednesday venue on Arizona, but it's an excellent market in its own right. It's in an attractive location, the recently renovated Virginia Park, and it's substantial in size, with 35 produce vendors, and seven prepared food stalls. Most important, Ted Galvan, who has managed the market since its establishment in 1992, vets the farmers to make sure they actually grow what they sell. Many managers don't bother or don't have the time to conduct farm inspections, but Galvan -- whose family used to own a local chain of Mexican restaurants named Hacienda Galvan -- has visited virtually all of his growers.

Embracing a bold experiment to alter human behavior, Santa Monica is poised to raise parking rates on the city's most coveted downtown spots to discourage some motorists from using them. The idea is to get people out of their cars and end what city leaders deem an ill-advised subsidy for public parking. By boosting rates, officials intend to make the parking closest to the congested Third Street Promenade expensive enough that some visitors will instead walk, take the bus or park in more-distant garages.

Wealthy families have played volleyball and paddle tennis on the sands of Santa Monica's Jonathan Club for generations, but the private social club played its own game of hardball recently when it looked as if it might lose three chunks of public beach property. With leases set to expire this year on three publicly owned beach parcels, the club threatened to sue Santa Monica if the city failed to renew lease agreements for 10 more years. The city acquiesced last month, after the Pacific Coast Highway club agreed to pay a significant increase in rent and contribute money for annual beach improvements.

Under a large shade umbrella in a Santa Monica courtyard, Lucie and Estella nibbled on cherry tomatoes and greeted moviegoers at a film festival screening Sunday morning. As film festival guests go, they were unusual -- they're chickens. Even for chickens, they are exotic -- Belgian bearded d'Uccles. Lucie is a deep orange hue speckled with black and white. Estella is black and white. And as befits a turn in the spotlight at a film festival, their feathered feet gave the appearance that they were shod in elaborate pairs of Christian Louboutin shoes.

Finally, the L.A. Marathon will make it to the Pacific. The new "Stadium to the Sea" route has received the imprimatur of the cities along the course, ensuring that runners next March 21 will have the point-to-point route they and organizers have favored. On Tuesday, the Santa Monica City Council approved the plan to end the race at the ocean.

They show up with lunch sacks and stuffed bears, an occasional doll. On Wednesday morning, most simply walked up the sidewalk with their parents in tow to the green, wrought-iron gate. One arrived in a shiny, black Audi SUV whose driver popped out to open the huge door for his charge. After a moment, a pair of tiny feet clad in hot-pink Crocs sandals dangled out and another youngster headed into the First Presbyterian Nursery School in Santa Monica. They are preschoolers.

First Hollywood floated the plan. Now, Santa Monica is talking about adding open space by building over freeways. City officials in Santa Monica are exploring the idea of "capping" the 10 Freeway between 17th and 14th avenues as a way to add seven acres of land to the city and possibly create more open space. The City Council voted Tuesday night to authorize city staff to submit an application to the state for $250,000 in grant money to fund a feasibility study for the idea.

Over its 15-year existence, Bergamot Station in Santa Monica has evolved from a ramshackle Southern Pacific rail yard turned water-heater factory into a world-class destination for art lovers. Its dozens of galleries, the Santa Monica Museum of Art and other artsy operations -- housed in scattered warehouse-style buildings clad in corrugated metal -- each year attract hundreds of thousands of visitors, many seeking the Bergamot Cafe's signature mint lemonade.

Progressive, eclectic Main Street in Santa Monica is notable for its green businesses. With organic cafes and boutiques catering to environmentally conscious living, this shopping street just steps from the Pacific is a great place to go green. But on St. Patrick's Day, going green means something else altogether. Between Hill Street and Rose Avenue, Main is prime for a bar crawl -- with taverns, lounges and alehouses aplenty -- making it an ideal place to toast the Irish spirit.