The Coast News

The Surfing Madonna is a 10 by 10 feet (3.0 m × 3.0 m) mosaic of the Virgen de Guadalupe created by artist Mark Patterson. It was covertly installed in Encinitas, California by Patterson and his friend Bob Nichols, who posed as construction workers during the installation. The city declared that the artwork was to be considered graffiti because of the illegality of its installation. Patterson came forward to accept responsibility for it, and was fined $500 and ordered to pay approximately $6,000 for the art's removal. It was removed in 90 minutes, and Patterson was allowed to keep the art. The response to the installation was divided: while some members of the Catholic and Latino communities took issue with it, others felt that it symbolized their Mexican heritage. The art is now in place across the street from where it was originally installed. It inspired a 501c3 non profit founded by Mark Patterson and Bob Nichols called "Surfing Madonna Oceans Project". Since the inception of the non-profit in 2013 the Surfing Madonna Oceans Project has donated nearly $600,000 to local ocean/beach/park and humanitarian programs.

Encinitas station is a commuter rail station in Encinitas, California that is on the NCTD COASTER] commuter rail line. In addition to COASTER, it is also served by three BREEZE bus routes. On October 7, 2013, the Amtrak Pacific Surfliner began stopping at four COASTER stations: Carlsbad Village, Carlsbad Poinsettia, Encinitas, and Sorrento Valley. Amtrak dropped service to Carlsbad Poinsettia and Encinitas on October 9, 2017, due to low ridership.

La Paloma Theatre is a historic Spanish Colonial Revival style movie theater in Encinitas, California.

Moonlight State Beach is a state beach in Encinitas, California. It is located one fifth of one mile beyond the point where Encinitas Boulevard turns into B Street after it crosses Highway 101.The beach area is well equipped for both children's and adults' recreation. It is popular with both tourists and residents, and it is one of the most visited beaches in Encinitas. This sand beach is used for surfing, swimming, surf fishing, beach volleyball, and bonfires.

Cottonwood Creek is a stream in San Diego County, California. It originates in the Cottonwood Creek Park in the town of Encinitas, then flows towards Moonlight Beach, where it discharges into the Pacific Ocean. Beginning in 1881 steam locomotives stopped to replenish their boilers with the water from Cottonwood Creek which produced the steam that moved the trains. A town formed around this site and would evolve into Encinitas. The creek was also a water source for the community in times of drought. For these reasons, in 1991 it was designated by the State of California a Point of Historic Interest.

The 1883 Schoolhouse is a restored one-room school in Encinitas, California. The oldest building in the city, it was built in 1883 to house the town's eight schoolchildren. The building currently functions as a museum.

S.S. Encinitas and S.S. Moonlight, designated by the National Register of Historic Places as the Encinitas Boathouses, are two houses made to look like a boat in Encinitas, California. Despite their appearance, they have never been to sea and are purely novelty architecture. The dwellings were added to the register on October 21, 2019. North Coast Current claims that they are the most photographed buildings in the city.

North County is a region in the northern area of San Diego County, California. It is the second-most populous region in the county (after San Diego), with an estimated population of 869,322. North County is well known for its affluence, especially in Encinitas, Carlsbad, Del Mar, Rancho Santa Fe, and Solana Beach, where house prices range, on average, above $1,000,000. Cities along the 78 freeway (Oceanside, Vista, San Marcos and Escondido) have more mixed incomes. Beach culture is prominent in the area, and many of the region's beaches and lagoons are protected areas to help ensure the environment remains pristine, though there has been pressure from commercial entities to develop some of these areas.

The Self-Realization Fellowship (SRF) Encinitas Hermitage and Meditation Gardens is a religious center in Encinitas, California, United States created by Paramahansa Yogananda. Its Golden Lotus Tower rises above the white wall along Highway 101 near Swami's Seaside Park. The meditation gardens are open to the public, and the compound also contains a monastic ashram that is home to SRF monks, nuns, and male postulants (monks in training).

The San Diego Botanic Garden, formerly Quail Botanical Gardens, is a botanical garden in Encinitas, California, United States. At 37 acres (150,000 m2), the garden includes rare bamboo groves (said to be the largest bamboo collection in the United States), desert gardens, a tropical rainforest, California native plants, Mediterranean climate landscapes, and a subtropical fruit garden. The name of the facility was changed in 2009 to better reflect the garden's status as a regional attraction.Located 30 minutes north of San Diego in Encinitas, California, San Diego Botanic Garden features numerous exhibits, including rare bamboo groves, desert gardens, a tropical rainforest, California native plants, Mediterranean climate landscapes, succulent gardens, an herb garden, firesafe landscaping, a subtropical fruit garden, and native coastal sage natural areas. The Hamilton Children's Garden was opened in June 2011, the largest interactive children's garden on the West Coast. Until 1957 the gardens were the private estate of Ruth Baird Larabee, at which time she donated her house and grounds to the County of San Diego. The Quail Botanical Gardens Foundation was established in 1961. In March 1970, the Quail Botanic Garden opened as a public botanic garden. The name was changed in 2009 to San Diego Botanic Garden. Today the gardens include over 5,000 varieties of plants from all over the world including tropical, subtropical, and California native plants. Collections include a tropical plant exhibit in the Dickinson Family Education Conservatory (opened in 2020), the climate-based gardens for the New World and Old World Desert, Coastal sage scrub, Sub-Tropical Fruit, a Pinetum, a Palm Canyon, as well as geographically organized gardens for Africa, Australia, Arid Madagascar Garden, Arid South America, the Canary Islands, Cape South Africa, Central America, the Himalayas, the Mediterranean, the Middle East, New Zealand, the Pan-Tropical Rainforest with a 60-foot waterfall.

Swami's is an area in San Diego County that contains Swami's Beach and other local attractions. The beach, also known as "Swami’s Reef'" and "Swamis", is an internationally known surfing spot, a point break located in Encinitas, San Diego County, California. Swami's was named after Swami Paramahansa Yogananda, because the grounds and hermitage of the Self-Realization Fellowship ashram, built in 1937, overlook this reef point. The name "Swami's" is also given to the sand beach that extends south from the point to the next beach access point, which is next to the San Elijo State Beach camping area; this more southerly surf spot often goes by the name "Pipes". Originally the name "Swami's" was an unofficial nickname that surfers had given to the point break, but eventually the name was adopted officially, and also used as the name of the cliff-top park, which was previously known as "Seacliff Roadside Park".

San Dieguito Heritage Museum is a history museum in Encinitas, California, in the United States. Founded in 1988, the museum displays historical photographs and artifacts from Encinitas and the entire San Dieguito area. San Dieguito historically comprises seven communities: Cardiff-by-the-Sea, Del Mar, Encinitas, Leucadia, Olivenhain, Rancho Santa Fe, and Solana Beach in the North County area of San Diego County and their adjacent areas, including parts of southern Carlsbad and northwestern San Diego. The museum is a nonprofit organization that is primarily staffed by volunteers with limited paid staff. The museum is supported by contributions from its members and the wider community at large. In 1993, the museum published San Dieguito Heritage by Maura Wiegand (ISBN 9780963592606). In 1998, the San Dieguito Heritage Museum received a $5,000 challenge grant from the Thomas C. Ackerman Foundation. In 2007, the Rotarians helped the museum spruce up its new location.In May 2008, the museum opened a ground-breaking new exhibit on skateboarding in the San Dieguito area. It was the first exhibit of its kind in southern California. The most recent exhibit is the Bumann Ranch Exhibit. It will celebrate the placement of the Bumann Ranch on the National Register of Historic Places and the contributions of the Bumanns to record and preserve the history of the Colony of Olivenhain in the San Dieguito region.The museum regularly provides visiting third-grade school groups with a special local history tour geared to their state-mandated curriculum. Many other tours and programs are available by request. Several special events, including an old-fashioned community barbecue, are held during the year.