this post was submitted on 27 Apr 2024
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?? Socal is pretty ugly. It has gross rolling hills that remind me of S. Idaho, suburban sprawl, and the beaches are all crowded. San Diego is nice, but pretty much anything between San Diego and SF Bay area is pretty ugly imo, and that's where most of the population lives.
Northern California is pretty though, as are the national parks. But imo, pretty much everything California has, somewhere else does it better:
I really don't like visiting Cali. My in-laws live in LA and my cousin's live in SF, and both are unpleasant to visit imo. If I had to live anywhere, I'd probably pick San Diego or northern Cali (well north of SF.
I currently live in Utah, which I much prefer. It has:
If I moved, I'd probably go east (N. Caroline seems nice) or back to the Northwest (grew up near Seattle, so I'd probably go east of the mountains for more sun). Never to California.
I'm very much not a desert person, but the scale of the inland valley, the quiet beauty of Joshua tree, etc... Moved from socal, but there was a lot of beauty that doesn't call you to it loudly, you just suddenly notice and enjoy it.
Joshua tree looks like a bunch of rocky hills... Till you notice they're all rounded and stacked perfectly. You notice how arid it is, and then notice green leaves in spite of that.
If you're observant, there's beauty everywhere natural.
Sure, but try comparing that to southern Utah, western/central Colorado, northern Arizona/New Mexico, or western Wyoming/Montana.
There's cool stuff in Cali, it's just largely locked away in national and state parks. In all of the areas I mentioned, you can live in that beauty all the time, or go visit national and state parks for even more of it.
In my area, I can be away from people and among natural beauty with a 15 min drive up the canyon, or ride my bike about 30 min to hit some trails. I look out my windows and see towing mountains, and on my commute I can take the long way (about 15 min extra) and drive through the mountains instead of the highway.
Cali is fine if you're into urban stuff and want beauty on the weekends and are fine sitting in traffic to get there. I prefer beauty all the time.
Not knocking your choices, just to be clear. I do in fact like keeping up with entertainment and arts, can't really get concerts, symphonies and plays out in the hills. For me and many others, cities are great. There are places that are still nestled in the hills with small town vibes in soCal, check out Silverado canyon as an example.
I camp when I want to reconnect to nature, and ride my bicycle all over the place. Cities can be very beautiful in their own right, though I admittedly have an engineer's bias when viewing.
I'm like 40 min from downtown SLC, and there's a commuter rail like 10 min from my house. So going to concerts, symphonies, and plays really isn't an issue.
Worst case, I'll take a flight to an urban center for a weekend (regular flights to NYC, SF, LA, etc) if there's an event I really want to go to (I like the Seattle Nutcracker). Vegas is like 6 hours away, so it's also an option for events.
Likewise if I lived near Denver.
Looks nice, but a bit pricey. Then again, my area is getting pretty pricey as well (like $500-600k for a decent place, when it used to be $200-300k when I moved here).
I would be a bit nervous about fires and flooding though. No issues with that in my area.
Sure, and I like visiting ours, I just don't want to live in one. Give me close access to commuter rail and a canyon and I'm happy. That way I can get the best of both worlds.
My main complaint is that my area isn't very bikable, so I bought a house right next to a major bike path, which goes like 20 miles in either direction through fields, near urban areas, and along train tracks. I used to commute 10 miles each way on that path for work, and I regularly exercise on it now that I commute to far (25 miles downtown). Most of my trips are fine on a bike, with the grocery, library, and lots of parks within a mile or two with no major roads in between (or just one with a solid crosswalk).
Utah is gorgeous.
There are definitely parts of Socal that are ugly. Also parts that are sublime.
Eh, I've been around a but and the "good" parts usually have better analogues elsewhere. And then you add all the smog and traffic and it's just not where I want to spend my time.
The weather is nice and predictable though, so I'll give it that.
someone from utah complaining about smog somewhere else? now I know they haven't left the state in decades.
It only sucks in February and parts of November. Most of the year it's totally fine. Most days are green, with a handful of red and yellow throughout the year, and most of the red days are from Cali and Nevada wildfires.
I grew up near Seattle, and I regular visit family there. We visit Cali (LA) almost every year too (my in-laws), and I visit family in Montana as well. My in-laws almost always have crappier air than us because smog in LA is a constant, instead of inversion-based like it is in Utah.
And yeah, I wish they air was better. We're doing something to fix it, with tier 3 gas at most stations (lower particulate emissions), lots of people moving to solar power (net metering), and EV charging stations getting more and more available. I wish we'd do more (e.g. tax big trucks like crazy), but air quality is rarely an issue.
That said, I'm acutely aware of air quality issues here because I used to commute almost every day by bike. It's worse near SLC, which is part of why I'm in northern Utah county (close-ish to downtown, but less pollution).