Southern California #1, Temecula: A Search for  History

Story and photography by
Nancy & Eric Anderson 

 

We have a reputation in Southern California , this land of warm weather and hot heads. It’s a strange place, outsiders say, an accumulation of nuts and fruits, a destination that happens when the people of restless America get stopped by the sea. Maybe so. But it can be a benign terrain, this land of Disney and Hollywood, this place of powder-white beaches and at times surprisingly cold seas, and this realm of laid-back, languid, contented folks who don’t travel much because they have it all in their backyard.

So if you have flown into LAX, don’t have the children or grandchildren with you and wonder what’s to see if you have a tank of gas in your rental car, here are three locations to explore that are all so different.

Temecula, California: The Mouse That Roared

Temecula is one of those rarities in Southern California: a big bustling city that had its own history and identity long before the developers’ bulldozers changed the landscape. The sign at each end of the main street says it all: Temecula Est. 1859. Period. This is not a long-winded place, another rarity in touchy-feely Southern Cal.

Some newer places, elsewhere, seem to spring from nothing. You drive past a farmer’s former fields, apparently blink for a second then suddenly you are on the town literally. Such areas with their Starbucks, Home Depots and CVS Pharmacies seem contrived. They are there simply because a contractor bought the land not because a native American tribe used to gather below a 1500 year-old oak tree at this point. Those other places have no history. They have no charm and often no heart.

Temecula, California, once a small town 60 miles north of San Diego, is different. The only city in California that still retains its Indian Luiseño tribal name (the word means “where the sun shines through the sea mist”), Temecula’s legends go back centuries. In fact, Mark Macarro, tribal chairman of the Pechanga People, proudly claims his tribe has lived in this lush valley for 10,000 years. They lived fairly peacefully -- and prospered until the arrival of the Spanish missionaries whose aggressive attempts to Christianize and indenture the natives almost completely wiped out tribal identities and their way of life.

Indian scout Kit Carson and the legendary mountain man Jedediah Smith passed this way in exploration. Settlers followed and the town became a stop on the Butterfield Overland stage route in 1858. In 1859 it had the seventh post office in California. When the Civil War came to a close local ranchers eyed the fertile fields and petitioned the San Francisco Court in 1873 so they could take possession of tribal lands. The sheriff of San Diego County actually rode up with a posse and a decree to evict in 1875 and forcibly removed the Indians from the land of their ancestors. In 1882 in a small measure of compensation, 4000 acres in the hillsides south of Temecula were created as the Pechanga reservation by the then President Chester Arthur. Although the executive order was signed by “perhaps the most unknown of our unknown presidents” the order had teeth. It enabled the tribe in 2002 to be given a further 1000 acres surrounding its fabled Great Oak, the “largest natural-growing, indigenous coast live oak in the United States.”

It’s not that the cowboys and Indians have disappeared. Far from it. You can still find ranchers in Temecula working the land and you sure can find Indians working the wealthy in the huge Pechanga resort and Casino developed in 2002 in what, at one time, was eight miles south of downtown. “We are reclaiming our place in the sun,” the Pechanga tribe says. Adds Audra Merrell, its public relations supervisor pointing to the towering icon that greets those entering. “This is the largest acrylic sculpture in the world and, with recent additions, our resort and casino is now larger than any casino in Las Vegas.” And proving that money may be the best revenge, the Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians through its resort and casino now – at last count – directly employed more than 5,000 persons, purchased $185 million worth of goods and services and spent $250 million in improving the funding and infrastructure for its people. The word Pechanga in tribal language is said to mean “the place where water drips,” but now with its vast casino the word more apply might imply “the place where the money flows.”

You’d expect the money to flow -- from your wallet – also if you choose the upscale Temecula Creek Inn as a place to stay for a Temecula visit but it’s remarkably reasonably priced, perhaps because the city is some distance from California’s major expensive cities. The inn is one of four owned by the high-end JC Resorts who also have the Rancho Bernardo Inn; the Surf and Sand Resort, Laguna Beach; and the Scripps Inn, La Jolla. The Temecula Creek Inn has a Golf Digest’s four Star 27-hole course right there beside it. Your companions can sit at the huge windows in the Temet Grill sipping a glass of Temecula Wine Country Merlot and watch you send sod flying as you swing on the tees below.

Luiseño tribal artifacts are framed on the walls in the inn. They pay tribute to the Indian heritage seen everywhere in the valley. Temecula’s history reads like a pulp novel. It has had Mexican-American War battles; fur trappers passing through and a Mormon battalion famously marching past during America’s Civil War; then Indian tribal massacres, stagecoach holdups, bank robberies, moonshine ventures, manhunts, street hangings, bare knuckle prizefighting in the Blind Pig Saloon, floods, cattle drives and ranching  -- all being a preamble to this part of the world’s destiny: real estate development. Now it holds festivals to celebrate Bluegrass, jazz, international film, ballooning, golf and wine. And still the city looks forward: the population hung at 27,000 in 1990, reached 58,000 in 2000 and, in 2006, jumped to 95,000. Many residents commute to jobs in San Diego or Los Angeles and most of them seem to be on the San Diego interstates at the same time as we are.

It’s a short trip in the car to visit the Temecula Wine Country and once you get there you find more than 20 wineries all very close to each other over a stretch of five miles. Typical of all wine areas, the vineyards vary from simple Maw and Paw efforts to elegant, beautifully conceived estates that offer expensive restaurants and chic spas – and wines that are gradually receiving recognition from regional gourmets and local wine gourmets. The best, despite its ho-hum name is, arguably, South Coast Winery Resort and Spa. That it has been created with an eye for charm and has its ambitions immediately apparent from the painting that hangs in its entrance. “This,” it seems to say, “is what Temecula wine country will be one day.”

That one day has probably arrived. The upcoming rival to South Coast, we’d guess is Ponte Family Estate Winery. Ponte has been growing grapes on the Temecula scene since 1984 and has plowed a lot of money into beautiful on-going premises on the Winery trail. The tasting room bustles with energy and if the maiden on one of the wine labels looks vaguely familiar it’s because the picture shows the now elderly matriarch of the family, Roberta Ponte, the owner’s mother, when she was an especially pretty young woman aged 19 years.

Those who are not wine snobs, er, excuse us, wine connoisseurs may wish to embrace something less elitist: exploring Old Temecula. This is a fun place of boutique oddball stores, antique shops, and great cowboy restaurants. Oddball? Well how would you describe a store specializing in olive oil with its own tasting room?

Catherine Pepe, pours the choices for her customers to taste at the Temecula Olive Oil Company. On the shelves are, for example, Gourmet Dripping Oil, Citrus Reserve Late Harvest, Unfiltered Early Harvest, Roasted Garlic, White Truffle and Vanilla & --  and eyeing the beard on one of us, “Did you know you can use olive oil to provide a closer shave than shaving cream?” No we didn’t. “You can use it, she continues, “to shine stainless steel, to remove eye makeup, to unstuck a zipper, to lubricate hinges on squeaky doors?” We didn’t and wonder furtively if the legendary Heloise would pay for those hints if we stole them.

Actually it’s an eye opener to see how a simple product so widely enjoyed in Mediterranean countries and the Middle East – for health and utility reasons -- can have, like the proverbial duct tape, so many other uses. Ms. Pepe says, “We’re ecologically focused. We’re giving back to the earth by practicing sound environmental principles in the field,  We offer lifestyle solutions for quick, healthy meals easily replicated at home.”

Catherine, we’ll drink to that.

You’ll get encouragement to do that at an antique mall of 30 dealers, the Old Town Mercantile, a few steps away. Built in 1891 from bricks made locally as a shop for 60 years for the area’s ranchers, it’s now one of Old Town’s treasures: As delightful a cornucopia of Americana as you will ever see in one place will be revealed as you explore a confusing labyrinth of nostalgia: 6,0000 square feet of fun. Don’t hesitate to ask staff questions or to seek out the general manager, Marcy Ray.

What are your interests? Old license plates? Victorian hats? Old travel posters? Tools your great grandpa used? Tin signs? Restored vintage furniture? Antique dolls? Old time candy? Your grandma’s recipe books? Train collectibles? Christmas gifts? Old photos? Quilts and cookie cutters, flags and wind chimes?

Don’t expect your visit to be quick. You won’t want to leave. Says Ms. Ray, “Our customers come from all over to relive the days of old when personal values were cherished. And, more practically, they return because of our wonderful products, our friendly service and, of course, our great prices.”

She waves her hands over the red hats in Miss Lillian’s Victorians, the delicate china in Cranberry Cottage and the flower arrangements and cushions at Simple Blessings and points at a sign above the door that says, Friendly Atmosphere. “The whole city should have that sign,” she says, “ in Temecula, we have a sense of community. Come and live with us. You’ll be welcome!”