Long Beach - Where the Queen Mary Lives
Long Beach, California is a city that used to apologize for it self. Once home to one of the largest U.S. Navy bases and Naval shipyards in the world as well as McDonnell-Douglas Aircraft and also often referred to as “Iowa by the sea”, Long Beach is currently home to over 600,000 residents. Where the downtown district once was crowded with sailors and merchant seamen from around the globe, sophisticated retail and hospitality establishments now flourish and the streets teem with shoppers and diners who seek quality in life.
Today, Long Beach is a city driving as hard and fast into the future as the cars that race it’s streets during the Long Beach/Toyota Grand Prix. People from all around the world immediately recognize the postcard view of the Long Beach shoreline because of the presence of the iconic Queen Mary. It’s 2007 and Long Beach no longer has anything to apologize for.
The city is a Southern California hub. A rapidly expanding port, one of the largest anywhere, brings foreign goods to eager U.S. consumers as it also ships America’s products to a waiting world. Half way, between Los Angeles and Disneyland, Long Beach is a destination for countless conventioneers and tourists who treasure its waterside beauty and modern amenities.
A thriving downtown nightlife and entertainment culture gives the city a most cosmopolitan feel. Eager urban homebuyers snap up loft-type condominiums soon after coming to market. The restaurant scene is a complimenting mix of well-respected national chains and fabulous freestanding operations. Small, boutique eateries dot the local landscape and offer the adventurous diner a diverse culinary experience.
The rest of the country may look upon Southern California as merely being a homogenous continuation of the Greater Los Angeles Sprawl, but the discerning traveler knows that Long Beach stands alone as a singular point of interest.
Make Long Beach part of your itinerary when visiting “The Left Coast”. And, if you live in these parts, make a point of coming to “The Beach” for an evenings entertainment. You’ll fast become one of the many who understand that Long Beach is nobody’s stepchild.
-Gordonn Blue
