How to Visit the Beach, Mountains, Stop for Lunch, Ride Some Rides and be Home for Dinner
The student’s guide to a whirlwind, budget-friendly Santa Cruz day trip
For college students in Sacramento, the three most popular attractions for a trip to the coast might be food, the beach, and photo ops. Santa Cruz, California, has all of those options. There are many attractions throughout Santa Cruz that can get you your travel fix, from amusement park rides to a twisted cabin in the woods — not to mention the great food and beach scenes.
Consider these three stops for a mini day-cation to Santa Cruz on a budget: The Mystery Spot, The Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk amusement park, and Splash Restaurant on the Wharf — all in a little less than 10 hours.
8:30 a.m. — Get Up and Get Going
To make the most of your day, you should leave Sacramento and head to Santa Cruz by 8:30 a.m. It usually takes about two to three hours to drive there so you will be to the Mystery Spot by 11–11:30 a.m. Leaving on a Saturday at 8:30 a.m. will make it so you are safe from the traffic of the week days. Taking highway 80 from Sacramento to highway 680, to highway 880, to highway 17 (Santa Cruz Highway) and exit onto Vine Hill Road will get you to the mystery spot the fastest. While you are driving and as you get closer, the iconic yellow bumper sticker that you see consistently on minivans in Northern California will start to appear more and more. I remember driving to Santa Cruz when I was 12 years old and as we got closer and closer to Santa Cruz all I could think about was the ocean. Then, out of nowhere, you will take a sharp right turn onto Mystery Spot Road off the winding Vine Hill Road and start a bumpy drive through the 80 foot trees to a haunted looking house in the middle of nowhere.
11:30 a.m. — A Look Inside the Mystery Spot
Many people don’t know that tucked away in these redwoods is The Mystery Spot. [465 Mystery Spot Rd. (831) 423–8897. mysteryspot.com] Before speaking to the Mystery Spot tour guide, all I remembered about this place from when I was little was that I entered into a creepy house in the woods and then the tour guides start doing what I thought was magic. After speaking to one of The Mystery Spot tour guides I learned a lot more.
The Mystery Spot is less about magic and more about math, science and your environment. You enter into this house and you immediately feel like everything is tilted and off balance. You can stand on a table and lean all the way off without falling , which to any 12-year-old would feel like magic. However, if you really dig deeper into the science behind the mystery spot you will actually find some pretty interesting facts and studies that will appeal to your 18–25 year old brain. Psychologists who’ve studied the Mystery Spot point out that the illusions here “derive from the fact that the house is tilted. […] The mechanism in us that’s responsible for determining the horizontal and vertical is mostly affected by what we see. If the context is screwy, that will throw off what we see as vertical and horizontal.”
Yes, all of this leaning and balancing may seem dauntaing and maybe even a little dangerous, but The Mystery Spot has safety rules to protect tourists. For instance, when you are leaning off of the slanted stairs that go straight up, you are advised not to lean too far or you could fall. The tour guides make sure you follow rules and guidelines, yet they are college students like you and me who want to have just as much fun as we do. Jane Hammon, a tour guide who happens to be a college student in Santa Cruz, told me how much she loved the people she worked with and what a great sense of humor everyone has. “I love puns,” she explained. “When I came here when I was 15, the thing that I fell in love with was the goofy humor that all of the tour guides had. When I started working here, I was very pleased to see that that continued.”
The Mystery Spot is also super-affordable for students: It costs $8 to enter, and it is free if you have an active military ID. According to Hammon, one of the biggest attractions about the Mystery Spot is the pictures that you get to keep forever. Snap a photo while you are leaning at a 45-degree angle off of a table because, yeah — your trip will be fun without it, but if you don’t post a picture on Instagram afterwards, did it really even happen?
12:30 p.m. — Lunch On and Around the Wharf
After visiting the mountains for some fun in a tilted house in the woods, you have only spent some money on gas and your $8 admission into the Mystery Spot all before 12 p.m. Next, you are going to be hungry. The coolest restaurant in Santa Cruz is going to be one with a view, and Splash Restaurant on the Wharf [49A Municipal Wharf. (831) 466–9766. splashonthewharf.com] is the place to go when you’re looking for something exciting while on a budget. The restaurant has dishes ranging from $11-$22 per person; the most popular dish is the Creamy Lobster Mac and Cheese.
Even more popular, according to manager Dustin Miller, is the view. “We are a restaurant on the wharf, so looking over the ocean is pretty cool,” Miller told me. “There are 10 tables that surround the bar, and they rotate around at a slow speed while you are eating. That way each table gets a window spot for about 10 minutes.” There are tons of different restaurants on the wharf but none that are as interactive as this one. However, consider making a reservation so you don’t get stuck waiting for a table.
1:30 p.m. — End Your Day at the Boardwalk
Now that your belly is full and the sun is out, its time to hit the beach. Admission to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk [400 Beach St. (831) 423–5590. beachboardwalk.com] is always free, but starting in June, expect other weekly events like free movie night (Wednesdays), free bands on the beach (Friday nights), and retro nights on Monday and Tuesdays where all rides are $1.50. Visitors can ride roller coasters, hit the video game arcades, eat crazy amusement park food like deep fried Oreos and giant turkey legs, and, of course, head out to the shore. Brigid Fuller, communications management for the Boardwalk, singles out the The Giant Dipper roller coaster as the Boardwalk’s main attraction. “Most people who come here want to ride that roller coaster as long as they are tall enough,” she explained. “It is not a really frightening ride; it is just really beautiful, and the view from it is incredible. And it is a national historic landmark that was built in 1924, so it has a lot of history.”
3:30 p.m.— Head Home in Time for Dinner
Your day has been full of good food, mysteries, adventures, science, rollercoasters, and even a history lesson. You have pictures of all of your experiences in order to keep your Insta profile up to date. Your whirlwind of a day is coming to an end, and now you get to enjoy the Saturday afternoon drive home with no traffic and a moment to reminisce on your mini day-cation and be home by 6 p.m.
Costs of Your Trip
-Mystery Spot entry — $8
-Lunch at Splash — $11-$22
-Games and Rides at the Boardwalk — $20-$30
Total: $60-$80
Time Management to Keep You on Schedule
-Leave — 8:30 a.m.
-Mystery Spot — 11 a.m. -11:45 a.m.
-Lunch at Splash — Noon - 1 p.m.
-Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk — 1:30 p.m. - 3:30 p.m.
-Home — 6 p.m.
