Belvedere ↓	Corte Madera ↓	Fairfax ↓
Larkspur ↓	Mill Valley ↓	Novato ↓
Ross ↓	San Anselmo ↓	San Rafael ↓
Sausalito ↓	Tiburon ↓	West Marin ↓

Belvedere

With water all around, the exclusive enclave of Belvedere is home to the oldest yacht club in California, the San Francisco Yacht Club at 98 Beach Road. It began in San Francisco in 1855, moved to Sausalito and then to Belvedere in 1927. 

Its name fits: Belvedere, an island on the tip of the Tiburon Peninsula, enjoys a “beautiful view” from all sides. 

Belvedere is not only the wealthiest community in Marin, it’s one of the top 10 richest towns in the United States. And no wonder. 

To the west, Mount Tamalpais is in clear sight across Richardson Bay from magnificent homes along San Rafael Avenue. To the south, the Golden Gate and Bay bridges point like graceful fingers at San Francisco’s skyline. In the middle distance, there’s the emerald green of Angel Island and the hazy gray of Alcatraz. 

It all adds up to a glorious setting and some of the most expensive real estate in Marin. 

Per capita income, tops in the county, totaled $113,600 in 2000. The census reported median family income was $185,600. 

Belvedere’s wealthy residents value their privacy and security so much that there is no city limits sign. They also enjoy the county’s lowest crime rate. 

The island was subdivided in 1890, and residents voted to become a city in 1896.  

Belvedere is almost entirely residential. “It is a small, close-knit community with a great hometown feel,” City Manager George Rodericks said. 

The hub of the city is a 450 San Rafael Avenue where City Hall, the Police Department and the Community Center are located. Next door is Community Park. 

But there’s more to do in Belvedere than gawk at the fabulous homes. 

During summer months there are concerts in the park where residents spread out blankets, bring picnics and enjoy the music. 

Check out the old houseboats along Beach Road or get a glimpse of China Cabin, a restored social hall from an 1866 sidewheel steamship, the S.S. China. Watch the sailboats on the lagoon – and try not to be too envious.
 

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Corte Madera

Commerce is king in Corte Madera, home of car dealerships, department stores, fine restaurants and two major shopping malls. Shoppers flock to the town, attracted by The Village, with more than 80 stores, anchored by Nordstrom, and Town Center, a hub of shops and restaurants in an attractive setting complete with fountains. 

Town coffers fill with roughly $3 million in annual sales tax revenue from The Village and Town Center alone. The town got another &800,000 in sales taxes from auto dealers. 

“The two large shopping centers, as well as the entire business community, allow Corte Madera to be the wonderful community it is because of the sales tax we generate,” said Stan Hoffman, property manager at Town Center. 

It’s a far cry from 1916, when residents voted 140 to 46 to incorporate. At the time, you could buy all the real estate in town for about $350,000. 

Bordered by open space preserves, mountains, a creek and the bay, Corte Madera has some of the county’s most desirable vistas. 

“It’s got a magnificent natural setting, and our main thoroughfare, which is Tamalpais Drive, is about the prettiest main street in Marin County, because you’ve got that fabulous view of Mount Tamalpais,” said Jana Haehl, who has lived in town for 42 years. “There’s just not a prettier entrance to a community in Marin.” 

Since it was settled in the 1800’s, Corte Madera has been a prime destination for entrepreneurs. Because it’s at the intersection of Corte Madera Creek and San Francisco Bay, the town in its early days was a busy port for lumber barges, steamboats and whaling boats. 

In the 1890’s, the Northwestern Pacific Railroad came to town, putting a train station in the village square and spawning a new wave of local commerce and neighborhood activity. 

From 1916 t o1940 the town’s population grew from 500 to nearly 1,100. From 1940 to 1970, the population increased to 9,400. Today, there are about 9,100 residents. 

Off the freeway and beyond the malls, the town is very much a place of neighborhoods dotted with parks, wetlands, open space preserves and hillside homes. 

Corte Madera, which means “cut wood,” boasts a popular bookstore, Book Passage and not-to-miss restaurants like Marin Joe’s, a county dining institution at 1585 Casa Buena Drive that has been in business for 50 years. 

“We have a very well-run town,” said Councilman Michael Lappert. “We have developed commercial property responsibly…which allows us to maintain probably the finest parks in Marin County.”
 

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Fairfax

Fairfax is the most progressive city in Marin County, giving Berkeley a run for its money as the Bay Area’s most liberal municipal enclave. 

As the Fairfax Theater’s neon sign beckons, visitors are greeted at the town limits by anti-nuke signs and a row of nightclubs that provide the heart of Marin’s love music scene. The county’s only medical marijuana clinic, just across from a downtown baseball field, posted receipts of more than $1 million last year. 

Three years ago, the Town Council, at a meeting featuring Daniel Ellsberg of Pentagon Papers fame, became the first city in Marin to protest provisions limiting personal freedoms in the USA Patriot Act. The town enacted the county’s first pesticide control ordinance and, when a local market advertised a sale of swordfish steaks, residents dressed as turtles turned out to protest. 

“Fairfax speaks its mind,” said Councilman Frank Egger, first elected in 1966 to the Town Council and re-elected every four years since on an anti-development platform. His allies on the council include two members of the Green Party. “We’re not afraid to take a stand on issues,” he said. 

Fairfax got its name from Lord Charles Snowden Fairfax, Baron of Cameron, a Virginian who moved to California in 1849. He became a member of the state Assembly and made his home, called Bird’s Nest Glen, at what is now the old Marin Town and Country Club at the eastern edge of town. 

Between 1910 and 1923, Fairfax was the setting for dozens of “Bronco Billy” western movies. The town had its own movie studio, United Keanograph Studio. 

The town took on the air of a resort with the development of the country club, which became a destination for wealthy families until it fell into a state of disrepair and closed to become a low-income rental district. 

Fairfax is the gateway to West Marin for outdoor enthusiasts. Bicyclists and hikers can explore trails leading to Lagunitas, Bon Tempe, Alpine and Kent lakes. Bicyclists rally en route to trails in a town that is home to cycling notables Joe Breeze and Otis Buy, who developed mountain biking in the 1970’s. 

And music fans jam in to watch top acts perform at downtown’s popular 19 Broadway club, and pack adjacent venues as well, including Vise Grip’s Tiki Lounge, Café Amsterdam and Peri’s. 

“The variety is quite extensive,” said Arlen Philpott, a 40-year resident who organizes an annual Music in the Park series. 

The biggest weekend of the year is centered around the Fairfax Festival in June. Thousands come for an only-in-Fairfax parade, food, drink and live music. 

Philpott said that the sense of community is apparent. “It’s a good place to bring up kids,” he said. “There isn’t much traffic and it’s a safe place.” 

The city rehabilitated Peri Park – nestled inside a grove of redwood trees next to the fire station, making it one of the county’s best destinations for young families with children. 

Travelers can spend the night at the Fairfax Inn, and enjoy a weekend prime rib special at Deer Park Villa, established in 1922. For the best sandwich in town, try the grilled chicken with avocado and Swiss cheese at Fair Fix. Egger said people used to say the clock in Fairfax stopped in the ‘60s, but the old saying is now a New Age asset. 

“What people shied away from is now why they want to come here,” he said.
 

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Larkspur

If Marin has a gourmet restaurant row, you’ll find it on Magnolia Avenue in Larkspur. Larkspur’s main street boasts some 15 eateries, including three – the Lark Creek Inn, the Left bank and the Italian pasticcerie Emporio Rulli – that are national dining destinations. 

“Good restaurants make a city prosperous, and a prosperous city attracts good restaurants.” Councilman Ron Arlas said.
 

The restaurant that started it all, the Lark Creek Inn, was launched by award-winning chef Bradley Ogden in 1988 in a gracious 19th century Victorian at 234 Magnolia Avenue. 

The Lark Creek inn company also opened Larkspur’s seafood restaurant, the New England-style Yankee Pier at 286 Magnolia. 

You can taste the sweetness of Italy at Emporio Rulli, an authentic Italian pastry shop at 464 Magnolia Avenue that also offers coffee, gelato, wines, Italian foods and kitchen products. 

Or go Parisian at the Left Bank, in the historic Blue Rock Inn at 507 Magnolia, and sample its affordable French “cuisine grandmere.”
 

Larkspur exudes the ambience of a town whose downtown is listed in the National Register of Historic Places as “typical of small California town at the turn of the century.” 

The barn doors of an early-1900s blacksmith shop remain at 450 Magnolia Avenue, even though the building, now know as the Silver Peso Bar, has been a tavern since the 1930s. Corbet’s Ace Hardware, a family-owned operation in a Home Depot era, has been in business for 50 years at the west end of town. 

“It still retains its small-town character,” said Mayor Joan Lundstrom, a 35-year resident who has served on the City Council for two decades. 

“We have a historic downtown and an identifiable town center, and people are still nostalgic about its history,” she said. 

Approaching the 100th anniversary of its incorporation in 1908, Larkspur looks much the same now as it has for decades. The fire department horn blasts twice a day from City Hall, just as it has for 70 years.  

Oddly enough, the tranquil town was home for a wild child of the 1960s. Rock singer Janis Joplin’s home in a wood-shingled house on woodsy Baltimore Avenue was a sanctuary from her chaotic rock-and-roll stardom. She was living there in 1970 when she died of a drug overdose at a Hollywood hotel.
 

Larkspur was developed by Charles Wright, whose wife spotted fields of lupine but thought the flowers were larkspur and gave the town its name. 

Most of Larkspur lies inland, but a portion fronts the bay and serves as home to Marin’s largest ferry terminal. Marin Airporter, a bus service, is based nearby. 

As placid as Larkspur is, the town has not been immune to change. 

A portion of the famous wooden railroad trestle – from which Harry Callahan, played by Clint Eastwood in the “Dirty Harry” movie, jumped onto a moving school bus – was demolished after being struck by a big rig. 

The Rose Bowl – an open-air dance pavilion off Cane Street that drew an average of 2,000 people on Saturday nights – was discontinued in 1963 after 53 years of operation. 

But some things are too precious to lose. After one of the town’s most recognizable sites – the Lark Theater, an art deco moviehouse built in the 1930s – closed in 2000 due to poor attendance, residents banded together to raise $400,000 and reopened the moviehouse. 

Now, Larkspur is a destination for dinner – and a movie.
 

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Mill Valley

Mill Valley has its own film festival, a song that put it on the map and a charming downtown that’s a magnet for tourists and locals alike. 

Two national financial magazines, Money and CNN/Money, in naming Mill Valley one of the 10 top cities in the nation in which to live, put it this way: “Dot-com millionaires and power couples in the film and music industries are flocking to what long ago was a hangout for artists and reformed hippies.” 

The result of this unusual blending is, stated Money and CNN/Money, a culture “interested in maintaining the town’s low-key, back-to-nature atmosphere. Think fleece and flip-flops, not fur and stilettos.” 

You can feel Mill Valley’s pulse in Lyton Square, a popular people-watching spot in the European style, especially from an outdoor table at the trendy Book Depot Café, a former Greyhound bus station. 

In the square, chess players hunch over tables donated by the late rock impresario Bill Graham, kids play hopscotch, street musicians strum guitars and young people put on acrobatic exhibitions with hacky sacks. 

While shopping in Mill Valley’s fashionable boutiques, it’s always fun to keep an eye out for celebrities like rock stars Bonnie Raitt, Bob Weir and Sammy Hagar, who live in the hills. 

Evenings are alive with diners around the square. Piazza D’Angelo is a lively scene, Jennie Low’s serves healthy Chinese cuisine, La Ginestra is old-style Italian. Live music fans crowd into Sweetwater. 

Each fall for the past 28 years, the Mill Valley Film Festival has attracted stars, filmmakers and movie buffs from around the world. 

Hikers and mountain bikers are drawn to the trails and fire roads of majestic Mount Tamalpais, Marin’s “sleeping lady.” 

For more than 90 years, the outdoor amphitheatre on Mount Tam has hosted the Mountain Play, an annual Broadway show that draws thousands of theater-goers every spring. 

Old Mill Park, where the county’s first sawmill was erected in 1836, is a shady haven of redwood groves and waterfalls. The rustic setting is the site of the annual Fall Arts Festival. 

Although early residents preferred the name Mill Valley, the town was once renamed Eastland for developer Joseph Green Eastland. In 1900, citizens incorporated and reclaimed the name Mill Valley. 

In those early days, the Mill Valley and Tamalpais Scenic Railroad established the town as a tourist destination. The eight-mile, 281-curve ride on “the crookedest railroad in the world” took sightseers up and down the mountain until 1930, when the company went belly up. 

Mill Valley is the starting point for the Dipsea Race, the second oldest footrace in the United States, dating to 1905. The 7.1-mile course starts with 676 stairs and doesn’t get any easier as runners sprint up and down steep trails to the ocean each spring. 

The city has a nine-hole golf course at 280 Buena Vista Avenue. Dogs and young soccer players love breezy Bayfront Park, and a bustling Community Center at 180 Camino Alto is the focus of civic life. 

As it was put by one longtime resident, Denise Meehan, when learning of Mill Valley’s top-10 livability ranking: “It should be number one, but I don’t want anybody to know about it.”
 

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Novato

Novato, sprawling along the last Highway 101 exits before Sonoma County, has a lot more character that some give it credit for. 

It claims more than its share of rock star power, providing a home for Metallica’s James Hetfield, Journey’s Jonathan Cain and Steve Smith, Tom Johnston of the Doobie Bothers, slide guitarist Roy Rogers and blues singer Angela Strehli and husband Bob Brown, who manages Huey Lewis and the News and owns Rancho Nicasio. Former members of the Grateful Dead maintain a rehearsal studio in a Novato industrial park. 

At the same time, its suburban neighborhoods host a diverse populace of business executives, police and firefighters, professional and blue collar workers. 

With a newly remodeled historic downtown, a destination shopping mall at Vintage oaks and an eclectic group of nationally-known businesses taking up residence at Hamilton Field, Novato blends suburban as well as country living with vibrant commercial activity. 

A strong family community, Novato has more than 7,600 students in its school system. 

Shopping attractions range from the traditional stores and boutiques on Grant Avenue in “Old Town” to the sprawling Vintage Oaks Shopping Center, anchored by Costco and including more than 50 stores just off the Rowland exit on Highway 101. 

The city is home to Fireman’s Fund Insurance Company, one of the county’s largest employers. 

The nonprofit Buck Institute for Research in Aging, a striking complex tucked on the slopes of Mount Burdell, is on the leading edge of biomedical research. 

With more than 3,600 acres of open space, Novato’s rural areas can make visitors believe little has changed since 1839, when Spaniard Fernando Feliz received a land grant. 

Olompali State Historical Park, just north of the city, is named for a key Miwok settlement, Olemaloke, that dates to 1300. Scholars debate the significance of an Elizabethan coin found nearby: Did it belong to Sir Francis Drake, who hit the coast in 1579? 

Some say Spanish soldiers visited Camilo Ynitia, the last son of the chief of the Olompali Indians, in 1776 at the rancho. No doubt they marveled at the view from one of the many trails at the 1,558-foot-high Mount Burdell, just as hikers looking out at the Petaluma River and San Pablo Bay do today. 

The only battle of the Bear Flag Rebellion, which led to California’s statehood, was fought at Olompali in 1846. 

The Burdell family established the first formal gardens in Marin there in the 1870s. 

The Chosen Family hippie commune – serenaded by Janis Joplin and a host of others – lived in the old Burdell mansion until it burned in 1969. 

Novato incorporated as Marin’s northernmost city in 1960. 

Hamilton Field, on the southeast side of the city, served as an Army airfield from 1935 to 1947 and continued military operations to 1975. After serving as a processing center for Vietnamese refugees, officials wrangled over the property for years before voters killed airport plans and the neighborhood opened in 1999 as a community of new homes and commerce, along with attractions including a 16,000-square foot skate park for kids. Tenants include Smith and Hawken, the YMCA, and the Marin Community Foundation, which administers the Buck Trust bequest benefiting Marin. 

Those looking for a bite to eat have plenty to choose from in Novato. Try the Wild Fox Mesquite Fired Kitchen at 225 Alameda del Prado, or Cacti at 1200 Grant Avenue. 

The Pacheco Ranch Winery off the Alameda del Prado exit on Highway 101 offers visitors a chance to see how grapes are grown and taste wine bottled at the ranch – the oldest land grant property in California. 

And don’t miss Novato’s recreation jewel, Stafford Lake Park, a 139-acre tract on Novato Boulevard featuring fishing and hiking opportunities as well as fields for softball, volleyball and horseshoe games.
 

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Ross

Legend has it that shortly after moving to Ross, movie star Sean Penn wandered into the Barn Theatre across the road from his new home. He was unceremoniously asked to leave by someone in the local theatre group who didn’t recognize him. 

Although embarrassing at the time, the incident fits the town’s image as a place where the wealthy and the famous, including rock stars and CEO's, can live in relative privacy in leafy neighborhoods where the median household income tops $102,000. 

The town has a history of its own in films. Shady Lane, with its towering elm trees and gracious homes, was pictured prominently in the first “Godfather” movie as the street Al Pacino walked down with Diane Keaton. In “Jack,” Robin Williams lived in a restored Victorian off the Ross Commons.
 

Those who drive through Ross on Sir Francis Drake Boulevard are familiar with the abstract sculpture of a bear by the famed San Francisco artist Benny Bufano that sits on the lawn in front of the police and fire departments and serves as the town’s official symbol. 

Many families with children are drawn to Ross by its two fine schools. Much of the town’s community life is focused on the private Branson School and the public Ross School, which boasts an elaborate gala auction every two years featuring only-in-Marin items such as backstage passes to rock shows, a week in New York City with Tony Award tickets and a guitar signed by Carlos Santana. Volunteering on its fund-raising committee has become almost a prerequisite for those wanting to get elected to the Town Council.
 

The town is named after Scotsman James Ross, who paid $50,000 in gold coins for 8,857 acres in 1857. Even then, Ross – which now commands some of Marin’s highest housing prices – cost a pretty penny. 

Ross died five years later and his widow, Annie, deeded 1.4 acres to the North Pacific Coast Railroad on condition the rail depot, known as Sunnyside Station, be named after her late husband. 

Their daughter, Annie Ross, and her husband built their estate on 21 acres that now make up the Marin Art and Garden Center, one of the loveliest spots in the county for fashion shows and fund-raisers. 

The couple was involved in horticulture and, during travels abroad, brought back exotic plants to beautify their estate. Financial hardships eventually forced them to sell the property, but despite land transfers, fires and earthquakes, their original “Octagon House” remains on the grounds.
 

Town residents, many of whom were wealthy San Francisco entrepreneurs living in county estates, incorporated Ross in 1908. Ross officials wasted no time in requiring dog licenses, permits to cut trees – even more precious then than today, because wide tracts had been clear cut – and limiting trains to 15 mph. 

In 1909, designer John Buck Leonard was hired to build all five of the town’s distinctive concrete bridges over a meandering creek. 

Almost a century after incorporating, Ross hasn’t changed much. There are fewer than 800 households, only a handful more than a century ago, and many streets are lined with dirt paths rather than concrete sidewalks. 

Since there is no mail delivery, the Post Office, once the town train station, has become a popular place for Ross residents to meet. 

Maintaining that small-town character is serious business in Ross, and the town code is strictly enforced. Recently, a town councilman with a property-rights philosophy resigned his seat, citing frustration over what he considered Town Hall’s excessive regulation of home-improvement projects. 

Even a recent request by the Lagunitas Country Club to extend its party hours by 15 to 30 minutes was turned down by Town Hall. 

“Ross is a very special place,” former Mayor Thomas Byrnes said. “But it didn’t get that way by accident.”
 

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San Anselmo

San Anselmo, the acknowledged “antique capital of Northern California,” was named “Best in the West” for antique shopping by Sunset Magazine. Antique shops are only one proud feature in San Anselmo’s downtown, one of the county’s finest shopping districts. A newspaper once named San Anselmo the best “non-mall shopping city in Marin County.” 

Situated in the heart of the Ross Valley between wild child Fairfax and genteel Ross, San Anselmo also boasts several of the county’s finest restaurants, ranging from a three-star Mediterranean eatery, Insalata’s, to Bubba’s, an old-fashioned diner with celebrated comfort food. 

A family town, San Anselmo boasts a lively diversity. “It’s a community where you can always run into someone you know,” said City Councilman Peter Breen, who has lived in town since 1973. 

The area became a center of activity in the late 1800s because it was crossed by railroad tracks that led to the coast, Sonoma County, San Rafael and Southern Marin. The town was originally called San Anselmo, but its name changed to The Junction in 1875 – only to flip back to San Anselmo in 1883. The city was incorporated in 1907.
 

San Anselmo remains one of the county’s major transportation junctions, with five roads coming from Ross, Fairfax and San Rafael converging at the Hub. 

San Anselmo is noted as a Northern California antique headquarters, with more than 100 dealers offering collectibles, glass, jewelry and furniture. 

The town has a European atmosphere thanks to the San Francisco Theological Seminary, whose stone buildings and spires rise like castles in the sky above a quiet neighborhood just outside downtown. Town Hall is smack dab in the middle of downtown with a clock tower and a cast-iron deer named Sugarfoot. 

“They’re features that, when put together, you can’t find in too many other communities,” Breen said.
 

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San Rafael

San Rafael is Marin’s largest and most diverse city. “It’s the center of the county as far as the cities go,” said Jean Starkweather, a longtime civic booster and environmental activist. “All the roads go through San Rafael.” 

The city’s downtown has enjoyed a remarkable renaissance in the past decade, with an infusion of shops, office and housing complexes, restaurants and the meticulously restored Rafael Film Center, an art deco landmark and cultural treasure. 

The theater, opened in 1918 as The Orpheus, was closed by fire in 1937. It reopened a year later as The Rafael, but closed again in 1989 following the Loma Prieta earthquake. The Rafael Theater reopened in 1999 and is operated by the California Film Institute, which produces the annual Mill Valley Film Festival. 

San Rafael’s Fourth Street gained notoriety as a typical California main drag when it was used by George Lucas as a setting for the cruising scenes in his “American Graffiti” film classic. 

San Rafael sparkles with ethnic diversity. The largely Latino Canal Area adds a growing multicultural flavor. About a quarter of the city’s population is Latino, but many other ethnicities call the city home as well. Several dozen languages can be heard at San Rafael High School. 

The city’s Hispanic roots are reflected in graceful St. Raphael Church, built on the site of the original Mission San Rafael Arcangel, founded in December 1817 by Spanish Franciscans. One of only two North Bay missions, the church sits on a hill overlooking the city, as if giving San Rafael its blessing. While the original mission is gone, a replica serves as a chapel beside the main sanctuary. 

Throughout the city, communities are preserved, renewed and reinvented, largely through the work of residents and a network of neighborhood groups. 

“I think the diversity of our community and the rebirth of our neighborhoods has just been tremendous.” San Rafael Mayor Al Boro said. “The community input’s really there – the ownership.”
 

San Rafael is Marin’s cultural heart, home of the Marin Symphony and Marin Center, which presents national performers as well as international touring acts in the 2,000-seat Marin Veterans Memorial Auditorium. The Marin Civic Center, Frank Lloyd Wright’s architectural wonder, is the home of county government, including the jail and courthouse. A county history museum will rise in the city’s Boyd Park. 

Educational opportunities are varied and include Dominican University, a four-year college shrouded in stately trees and surrounded by Victorian architecture. More than 5,500 students are enrolled in the city’s elementary and high school system, and private schools, including Marin Academy, offer rigorous programs. 

Visitors enjoy a range of lodging choices, from the upscale Embassy Suites, popular with business travelers, to the romantic Panama Hotel, an eclectic hideaway in a residential neighborhood. Dining is a delight, with Thai, Vietnamese, Indonesian and other exotic fare as common as California, French and Italian specialties. San Rafael Joe’s, in the heart of downtown, has been a hometown favorite for generations. 

The Mall at Northgate is the county’s only indoor shopping mall, anchored by Macy’s Sears and multiplex theater. 

Located 17 miles north of San Francisco and stretching over 16.5 square miles, San Rafael is bordered by San Pablo and San Francisco bays. Development is balanced by open space – rolling hills, meadows, creeks and bay front parks. 

Bayside retreats include an historic shrimp village now home to China Camp State Park; East San Rafael’s Shoreline Park and McNear’s Beach Park, complete with pool and fishing pier facilities. 

San Rafael, one of California’s original 27 county seats in 1851, became Marin’s first city in 1874. 

As the time, the City Council met in a saloon on Fourth Street and got right to work, drafting an ordinance for “the prevention of animals from running at large in the town.”
 

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Sausalito

Visitors from across the world put Sausalito on their itinerary, right up there with Fisherman’s Wharf and the Golden Gate Bridge. 

In summer months, they take the ferry – call 773-1188 for schedules and fares – from San Francisco to wander through picturesque Princess Park, browse in the art galleries and shop in the boutiques along Bridgeway. 

There’s fine dining in waterfront restaurants such as Horizons or Spinnaker, with views of the bay and San Francisco. Tourists and locals alike rave about Poggio on Bridgeway.  

The Casa Madrona Hotel at 801 Bridgeway is a classic Sausalito experience. For Sunday brunch, it’s hard to beat the spread at Casa Madrona, then walk it off by visiting some of the city’s 17 parks, including inland groves and waterfront promenades. 

“We are a town of strollers,” City Manager Dana Whitson said. 

Few tourists venture over to Caledonia Street, Sausalito’s resident-serving district. There, locals can grab a latte before work, get a haircut, pick up dry cleaning, got to the hardware store or catch a movie at the Marin Theatre. 

Through the 1960s, Sausalito earned an enduring reputation as the bohemian haunt of artists, writers, actors, poets, hipsters and free spirits. The city long has been noted for its cast of unique characters, from Jack London and William Randolph Hearst to Zen master Alan Watts, artist Jean Varda and actor Sterling Hayden, not to mention a gangster or two, including “Baby Face” Nelson. 

Musician Otis Redding wrote his 1967 hit “(Sittin’ on) The Dock of the Bay” while in Sausalito. And in the 1970s, famed former Madam Sally Stanford served on the City Council, becoming vice mayor and finally mayor. 

“We have always had a history of being somewhat on the edge of social trends,” Whitson said. 

A rich waterfront community evolved with boat dwellers who made the bay their homes in harbors and marinas. Houseboat dwellers open their doors to the public during the annual Sausalito Floating Homes Tour. 

Sausalito is a town that knows how to throw a party. It plays host to an annual Chili Cookoff, the Caledonia Street Fair, a Classic Car Show and a July Fourth parade. During the summer, music lovers enjoy “Jazz and Blues By the Bay” concerts along the waterfront and Arias in the Afternoon, an hour of free opera in Gabrielson Park. 

But the biggest event is the acclaimed Sausalito Art Festival with 300 painters, jewelers, photographers and sculptors who exhibit amid live music and bay breezes at Marinship Park. 

Fort Baker, a federal facility, is in city limits and home to the Bay Area Discovery Museum since 1991. 

Once called Whaler’s Harbor, Sausalito was named by explorer Juan Manuel de Ayala, who noted that saucelitos – little willows – flourished on the shore. 

Sailors, whalers and men of war in the 1800s loved the port for its safe harbor, fresh spring water, abundant game and plentiful wood supply – as well as its saloons, gaming houses and bordellos. 

In 1893, the freewheeling community incorporated, and the city became a major railway and ferry center. During World War II, it was home to Marinship, where 17,000 shipyard workers built 15 Liberty ships and scores of other vessels for the war effort. 

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Tiburon

One of the most delightful experiences in Marin is dining on the deck of a waterfront restaurant in Tiburon, relaxing in the briny breeze and drinking in a spectacular view of the bay and the San Francisco skyline. 

With its outdoor deck, boat harbor and American and seafood cuisine, its collegial atmosphere and legendary Ramos fizzes, Sam’s Anchor Café on Main Street has been a favorite for decades.
 

Nearby, Guaymas, Servino’s and the Caprice are great choices with spectacular views of the bay. Combine lunch or dinner with a shopping excursion in the boutiques on Tiburon’s quaint Main Street. 

Visitors and locals alike hop the ferry to Angel Island State Park, the “jewel of San Francisco Bay,” a verdant island just across the deep, rushing water of Racoon Strait. 

Walkers and bicyclists can exercise and get an education at the same time on the Tiburon Historical Trail, a two-mile jaunt that begins at Blackie’s Pasture and proceeds through eight stations, ending at the Donahue building downtown. Each station has photographs displaying the site as it looked in decades past. 

“The scenic beauty is so dramatic,” said City Clerk Diane Crane Iacopi. “This is a fun walking town.” 

Another great hike is along Tiburon’s ridgetop open space, where you can see Old St. Hillary’s Church and take in views of Angel Island, Alcatraz and San Francisco.
 

Once named Punta de Tiburon, or Shark Point by Spanish adventurers, Tiburon was incorporated in 1964, making it Marin’s newest city. But it has long held an important place in county history. 

An early Main rail and shipbuilding center, Tiburon launched an era of growth in 1884 when Col. Peter Donahue expanded his San Francisco and North Pacific line from San Rafael, linking the trains with ferries to San Francisco. 

The old dual depot for ferries and trains, the only one in the United States west of New Jersey, is now a museum at 1920 Paradise Drive.
 

The Tiburon ferries ran until 1909, then returned in 1962 with the Red and White fleet. The town’s rail era ended in 1967, and the old rail site became the Point Tiburon condominium development. 

Today the Railroad Ferry Museum is housed in the Donahue Building on Paradise Drive and is designated a local historic landmark. 

Located just north of the Golden Gate Bridge, Tiburon is an 18-mile trip by car or a six-mile ferry ride across San Francisco Bay. 

For the sailing set, Opening Day on the Bay is a major spring event, and the town plays host to an annual Wine Festival, International Film Festival and a triathlon.  

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West Marin

Miwok Tribes held a special love for the West Marin panorama that stretches from Tomales to Muir Beach, Lagunitas to Nicasio, and the region no doubt provided ideal turf for Chief Marin. 

But the man who gave Marin its name is an elusive figure, and historians can’t agree on whether he was a Miwok chieftain of the Licatiut tribe who fought the Spanish, or an old Indian boatman who helped a Presidio commandant navigate the bay. Some say the chief later became a bay mariner. 

Marin historian Jack Mason contended Chief Marin waged war against the mission at Yerba Buena, fled to the Marin Islands, was captured and died at Mission San Rafael Arcangel in 1834. 

Theodore Hittel’s 1897 “History of California” said “there was an old Indian named Marin,” but adds the name is “without much doubt of Spanish or Latin origin and was not Indian, and may have been given by the missionaries to some capitanejo or prominent man among the Indians.” 

The name may have come from a 1775 map that called the bay “Bahia de Nuestra del Rosario, la Marinera” – Bay of Our Lady of the Rosary, the Mariner. 

Chief Marin was likely a relative of the coastal Miwoks who greeted Sir Francis Drake 200 years earlier in 1579, when the explorer landed at a “faire and good baye” in a land he called Nova Albion. Debate rages about whether the landing was at Tomales Bay, Point Reyes, Bolinas or elsewhere. 

In 1776, Franciscan missionaries estimated there were 3,000 Miwoks living north of San Francisco. They made their home in at least 44 North Bay settlements before falling victim to disease brought by Europeans. 

In 1850, when Marin became one of California’s original 27 counties, the once vibrant native population had dwindled to several hundred as entrepreneurs surged in to exploit timber, build railroads, plant orchards, raise cattle and develop land. 

But the rapid development that changed Marin’s landscape in subsequent years – especially after the Golden Gate Bridge opened in 1937 – would leave West Marin relatively unscathed, thanks in part to federal and state park acquisitions, tough zoning and efforts to preserve ranchlands. 

Today, West Marin is a constellation of communities, with some retaining names of Miwok origin. 

Although other theories abound, the name Bolinas might have been based on a Coast Miwok geographical destination, the late Marin historian Louise Teather reported in her book, “Place Names of Marin.” Nicasio was named for an Indian sheepherder who was baptized Nicasio, for Saint Nicasius. Olema took its name from Olemaloke, or coyote valley, a Miwok village on Tomales Bay. Tocaloma was another village site. 

Other West Marin communities drew their names from later residents. Irishman George Dillon moved to the beach in 1859. The railroad stop in 1875 near rancher Omar Jewell’s spread took his name. The Marshall brothers began moving in from Ireland in 1852. 

Stinson Beach – over the years also known as Belvedere Ranch, Willow Camp, Easkoot’s Beach and Camp Upton – is named for Nathan Stinson, who settled there in 1870. 

Point Reyes has one of Marin’s oldest place names, dating to Jan. 6, 1603, when a Spanish expedition headed by Sebastian Vizcaino sailed by. Because it was the Epiphany, or Twelfth Night, on the Christian calendar, when the three kings visited the baby Jesus in the manger, Vizcaino called the peninsula Punta del los Reyes, or Point of the Kings. 

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