San Clemente State Beach

San Mateo Rocks are uninhabited islands that lie approximately 0.5 mi (0.80 km) off the coast of California, to the south of San Clemente, and just north of San Mateo Point, a minor headland that marks the border between Orange County and San Diego County. The rocks rise about 3 ft (or about 1 m) above high tide. In 2017 the San Mateo Rocks, a pinniped haul-out and scuba destination, became part of the California Coastal National Monument.The Rocks first appear in the documentary record of the area in 1889, when they were described in the Coast Pilot. The sloop Victoria wrecked on the rocks in a storm in 1907. In 1931 the United States Coast Guard reserved the location (along with several other Orange County Rocks) for a possible future San Mateo Rocks Lighthouse, and an act of Congress assigned ownership to the Bureau of Land Management in 1935, but the lighthouse facility was never built. In the early 1970s the waters around the rocks were a collection site for seaweed species in genus Gelidium for use in agar production.The rocks host a transient population of California sea lions. Indigenous people may have used San Mateo Rocks as a pinniped hunting ground. On one occasion this population of sea lions attracted a pod of orcas—quite uncommon in local waters—who used a clever pack-hunting technique to force the sea lions off the rock and into the water where they would be ready prey. The rocks are a common destination for local dive boats.

La Casa Pacifica (Spanish: La Casa Pacífica, meaning "The House of Peace") is a classic California beachfront mansion located in the gated community of Cottons Point Estates/Cypress Shores in the South Orange County beach town of San Clemente, California, and overlooks the Pacific Ocean from its blufftop position. This estate is also known as President Richard Nixon's Western White House, used while living and working outside of the official presidential residence, the White House in Washington, D.C. The large Spanish-style California Mission Revival Style mansion was modeled after a country home in San Sebastian, Spain and was designed by architect Carl Lindbom. It was built in 1926 for Hamilton H. Cotton, one of the founding financiers of the city of San Clemente, and a Democratic Party backer who entertained President Franklin D. Roosevelt and other prominent Democrats as guests in his home. Around the time Nixon took office in 1969 he asked a young campaign aide, Fred Divel, to search the coast of Southern California for a presidential hideaway. Divel found the Cotton estate at the southernmost end of the then-sleepy San Clemente and immediately adjacent to the northern border of the massive Camp Pendleton Marine Base (USMC). Nixon bought the estate in 1969 from Cotton's widow, and dubbed the home "La Casa Pacifica". It was soon nicknamed "The Western White House" by the press, and the name was favored by Nixon himself; the latter became the term of subsequent similar presidential homes. After purchasing the estate Nixon made a number of alterations to the original home, done for both personal preferences and for the needs of the Secret Service. The tennis court was replaced with a swimming pool and much of the estate was wrapped by a 1,500-foot (460 m) C-shaped wall. The rose garden contains a magnolia that Pat Nixon brought as a seedling taken from the magnolia tree that Andrew Jackson planted at the White House.Today the almost six-acre (2.4 ha) estate includes about 9,000 square feet (840 m2) of living space, with tile and hardwood flooring, arched doorways and detailed groin-vaulted ceilings. Among its key features is the ocean-view office used by Nixon, an entertainer's pavilion, and a master suite with an expanded bathroom and closet area. Formal living spaces open to a classic hacienda-style patio courtyard with a hand-painted tile fountain in its center. The missing tennis court has since been replaced with a modern one. During Nixon's tenure as chief executive, the home was visited by such VIP guests as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Leonid Brezhnev, President of Mexico Gustavo Díaz Ordaz, Prime Minister of Japan Eisaku Satō, longtime aide Henry Kissinger and close friend Bebe Rebozo. It is an interesting historical footnote that U.S. Coast Guard LORAN Station San Mateo Point (located in southernmost San Clemente) would play a part in the Watergate scandal of the 1970s, which ultimately led to the resignation of President Nixon (ostensibly to avoid impeachment). According to the US Government Printing Office Web Site: In May 1975, the Watergate Special Prosecution Force (WSPF) decided that it was necessary to question former President Richard M. Nixon in connection with various investigations being conducted by the WSPF. Mr. Nixon was questioned over the period of two days, June 23 and June 24, 1975, and the testimony was taken as part of various investigations being conducted by the January 7, 1974, Grand Jury for the District of Columbia (the third Watergate Grand Jury). Chief Judge George Hart signed an order authorizing that the sworn deposition of Mr. Nixon be taken at the Coast Guard Station in San Mateo, California with two members of the grand jury present. Following the president's resignation, both he and his wife retired to the San Clemente estate, where Nixon composed his memoirs. During those years many in the local community still displayed their loyalty to the embattled former president despite the public embarrassment of the collapse of his political career. The Frost/Nixon interviews were originally planned for La Casa Pacifica, but radio signals from the Coast Guard's neighboring navigational-aid transmitters interfered with the TV gear; the interview had to be moved to the nearby home of a Nixon supporter.The Nixons sold their home to Allergan founder Gavin S. Herbert and his business partners and moved to New York City in 1980 before resettling in Park Ridge, New Jersey in 1982. A strong Republican donor, Herbert kept the home as his own while developing the area around it into an enclave of individual luxury mansions.The home has remained a private residence and was closed to the public; however, its legacy as a presidential retreat is still used as a calling card for the city of San Clemente. The road adjacent to Interstate 5 in the area is called Avenida del Presidente (Avenue of the President). The estate sits just north of some of the West Coast's best and most well known surfing spots, which cover four miles from San Onofre State Park through Lower and Upper Trestles and ending at Cotton's Point, itself one of the best big summer wave spots along the entire coast. In December 2009, the city of San Clemente passed a "Historical Property Preservation Agreement" to restore, improve, and preserve this historical building. Gavin Herbert publicly listed La Casa Pacifica for sale in April 2015, with an asking price of $75 million. He removed the property from the market in September. He relisted the property for $69 million in April 2016 and again received no offers, withdrawing it from the market in October. In 2017 and 2018, Herbert again offered the property at a reduced price of $63.5 million. In May 2019, the property was relisted at a discounted price of $57.5 million, but it had been removed from the market by early 2020. In April 2021, it was relisted for $65 million.

Panhe (Acjachemen: "the place at the water") was one of the largest Acjachemen villages confirmed to be over 9,600 years old and a current sacred, ceremonial, cultural, and burial site for the Acjachemen people. The site of Panhe is now within San Onofre State Beach, San Diego County, California, located at the confluence of San Mateo Creek and Cristianitos Canyon, approximately 3.7 miles (6.0 km) upstream from the Pacific Ocean.The Acjachemen people fished in San Mateo Creek's extensive freshwater marshes, and practiced a hunter-gatherer lifestyle. The village of Panhe is estimated to have had a population of 300 or so before the first Spanish explorers came to the area, and is still a sacred site for the Acjachemen people.Panhe is the site of the first baptism in California, and in 1769 saw the first close contact between Spanish explorers, Catholic missionaries, and the Acjachemen people. The village had the greatest number of baptisms in the records of Mission San Juan Capistrano.Panhe was nearly destroyed by a planned toll road construction that was meant to connect to Interstate 5, but this was stopped by a coalition of Acjachemen people, environmentalists, and surfer groups.There is a yearly festival held at the site by the Acjachemen people to honor their ancestors and to partake in their culture together. The United Coalition to Protect Panhe and The City Project advocate for the preservation of the site.

T-Street is a beach in San Clemente, California a short distance south of the town pier. It is a favored location of the local waterpeople for surfing and bodyboarding.

Trestles Bridge, more formally known as Railroad Bridge 207.6 or the San Mateo Creek Bridge, is a low railroad viaduct on the coast of Southern California, in northern San Diego County near its border with Orange County. The bridge lies within San Onofre State Beach and gave its nickname to the famed Trestles surfing site at that beach.

Trestles is a collection of surfing spots between northern San Onofre State Beach in San Diego County and southern San Clemente in Orange County in California. Trestles consists of, from north to south, Upper Trestles (Uppers), Lower Trestles (Lowers), and Middle Trestles (Middles). North of Upper Trestles is the surf spot called Cottons. South of Middles is the surf spot called The Church. Middles gets its name because it was a middle area between Trestles (both Uppers and Lowers breaks) and The Church (sometimes just called "Church". It is named after Trestles Bridge, a wooden trestle bridge that surfers must walk under to reach the beach, replaced in 2012 by a concrete viaduct.Lower Trestles consistently has the best waves of the group. For many years there was an WSL World Tour surfing competition held at Lowers every year, as well as the NSSA Nationals. Uppers is less consistent, but it has the potential to be a good wave with a long ride. North of Uppers is Cotton's Point, the location of former President Richard Nixon's home, La Casa Pacifica, aka "The Western White House", and the associated surfing spot of Cottons.

San Clemente Pier station is a passenger train station near the San Clemente Pier in San Clemente, California, United States. The station is lightly used – only four Amtrak Pacific Surfliner trains per day stop at the station (two trains in each direction), while Metrolink's Orange County Line and Inland Empire–Orange County Line only serve the station on Saturdays and Sundays (Metrolink also serves San Clemente station just north of this station daily).San Clemente Pier boarded or detrained a total of 15,017 Amtrak passengers in the 2013 fiscal year, an average of approximately 41 passengers daily, an over 50% increase from the 2012 fiscal year. Of the 74 California stations served by Amtrak, San Clemente Pier was the 54th-busiest in the 2013 fiscal year. In 2020, the ridership at the station dropped 57.4% to a total of 6,707, largely due to complications of the COVID-19 pandemic.The station was formerly a stop of the Santa Fe's San Diegan line.

San Mateo Creek is a stream in Southern California in the United States, whose watershed mostly straddles the border of Orange and San Diego Counties. It is about 22 miles (35 km) long, flowing in a generally southwesterly direction. Draining a broad valley bounded by the Santa Ana Mountains and Santa Margarita Mountains, San Mateo Creek is notable for being one of the last unchannelized streams in Southern California.One of the least developed watersheds on the South Coast, San Mateo Creek's drainage basin covers 139 square miles (360 km2) in parts of the Cleveland National Forest and Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton. The first inhabitants were Native Americans primarily of the Acjachemen and Luiseño groups, followed by the Spanish who established ranchos in the area. The creek's usually perennial flow made it an important source of irrigation water, then in the later 19th century, there was a gold rush in the upper watershed. Most of the little development in the watershed was agriculture-based. The San Mateo Creek watershed includes the subwatersheds of Los Alamos Canyon Creek, Tenaja Canyon Creek, Devil Canyon Creek and Cristianitos Creek with its tributaries of Talega and Gabino Creeks. Although grazing activities have hurt the biological quality of the semi-arid, Mediterranean-climate watershed, it still supports numerous biological communities including riparian zones, grassland and coastal sage scrub. A population of steelhead trout was identified in the creek in 2007, which population is adversely affected by continuing groundwater pumping, and which also may have been minimally impacted by minor agricultural runoff prior to cessation of farming activities along the stream aboard Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton.

Casa Romantica, officially known as the Casa Romantica Cultural Center and Gardens, is a historic building and nonprofit organization located in San Clemente, California that provides cultural programs. The organization was founded in 2002 by a charter of the City of San Clemente and is located at the historic home of Ole Hanson, who co-founded the city of San Clemente. Casa Romantica was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on December 27, 1991.

La Cristianita Canyon, or La Christianita Canyon, Los Cristianitos Valley, Canyon of the Little Christians, La Cañada de los Bautismos (the baptism on the Anza Trail) is a canyon now on the Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton in San Clemente, San Diego County. La Cristianita Canyon is a California Historical Landmark No. 562 listed on December 31, 1956. The site was a campsite for the Spanish Commander Juan Bautista de Anza and Father Francisco Garcés expedition of 1775 and 1776. The expedition camped at the site in July 1769. At the campsite was a spring where the expedition rested and watered its stock of mules, cattle, and horses. While at the campsite they found Native Americans that had sick children. Father Francisco Garcés baptized the child on July 22, 1769. This was the first Christian Baptism in Alta California. A historical marker is at the site of the a first baptism on Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton. Before the Marine Corps Base the site was on Mission San Luis Rey and then Rancho San Pedro. A second La Cristianita marker, open to the public is at the Casa Romantica Cultural Center and Gardens at 415 Avenida Granada, San Clemente. The marker was at the Civic Center. The Spanish Empire Anza expedition passed though the Imperial Valley then though the Colorado Desert, now the Anza-Borrego Desert State Park. The expedition's goal was to start Spanish missions in California and presidio forts though Las Californias to the San Francisco Bay. The expedition route is now the Juan Bautista de Anza National Historic Trail.

Oscar Easley Block, also known as Historic City Hall, is a prominent building that was one of the early founding buildings in San Clemente, California, originally built to house offices and a bank. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places listings in Orange County, California in 1983.

The Goldschmidt House, also known as Casa Tres Vistas, is located at 243 Avenida La Cuesta in San Clemente, California. It was designed in Spanish Colonial Revival style by architect Paul R. Williams and built in 1928. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2004.