Glossary

The words you’ll hear around Carmel-by-the-Sea — places, history, weather and local ways, explained

Search the glossary

Architecture

Courtyards and passageways: More than 40 hidden courtyards and covered walkways tucked between Carmel’s shops and cottages, a tradition dating back almost 100 years.
Fairy-tale cottages: Carmel’s storybook-style houses, with uneven roofs, small windows and stone chimneys, built from 1924 mostly by Hugh Comstock and still lived in today.
Hansel and Gretel cottages: Two of Hugh Comstock’s earliest storybook cottages in Carmel, built in the mid-1920s on Torres Street near Sixth Avenue; Hansel began as a doll house.
Hugh Comstock: The builder (1893-1950) whose fairy-tale cottages gave Carmel its storybook look, beginning with a doll house for his wife in 1924.
The Tuck Box: A storybook tea room on Dolores Street designed by Hugh Comstock in 1926, with a steep roof, stucco, faux timber beams and an uneven brick chimney.

Coast & Weather

Carmel Submarine Canyon: A deep underwater canyon just north of Point Lobos, part of the Monterey Bay canyon system, that pulls cold, nutrient-rich water toward the surface.
Cool-summer climate: Carmel’s mild, cool-summer Mediterranean climate: wet October to May, foggy summer mornings, and the warmest, clearest weather in September and October.
Marine layer: The cool, damp layer of air that sits over the ocean and rolls in as morning fog and low cloud, then often burns off by afternoon.
Sneaker waves: Unexpectedly large waves that run far up a beach without warning and can knock people off their feet or off rocks; they are a real danger on the California coast.
Upwelling: The process by which wind pushes surface water away from shore and cold, nutrient-rich water rises from below, feeding the coast’s plankton, fish and wildlife.

Events

Carmel Bach Festival: A classical-music festival in Carmel since 1935, built around J.S. Bach and based at the Sunset Center.
Monterey Car Week: A week of car shows, races, rallies and auctions on the Monterey Peninsula every August, climaxing with the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance on Sunday.
Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance: The annual classic-car show on the Pebble Beach Golf Links, widely seen as the most prestigious in the world and the finale of Monterey Car Week.

History & People

Carmel Art Association: Carmel’s oldest gallery, founded in 1927 by a small group of local artists and still run as a nonprofit showing work by Monterey Peninsula artists.
Carmel Arts and Crafts Club: The club formed in 1905 that became Carmel’s first cultural hub, with exhibitions, plays and lectures, until the Carmel Art Association took over the art side in 1927.
Carmel bohemians: The writers, poets, painters and actors who settled Carmel from about 1905, especially after the 1906 earthquake, and made it a famous California art colony.
Carmel Development Company: The firm formed in 1902 by James Franklin Devendorf and Frank Hubbard Powers that laid out the village core and sold lots to artists and writers.
Carmel Mission: Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo, moved to the Carmel River in 1771, headquarters of the California missions and burial place of Junípero Serra.
Clint Eastwood, mayor of Carmel: The film star served one two-year term as mayor from 1986, and that year bought Mission Ranch, which he saved from a condominium plan.
Edward Weston: The photographer who moved to Carmel in 1929 and made many of his best-known nature pictures at Point Lobos.
Esselen: The Native people of the Santa Lucia Mountains and the Big Sur coast, one of the smallest populations in California when the Spanish arrived.
Junípero Serra: The Franciscan who founded Mission San Carlos in 1770, moved it to Carmel in 1771, ran the California missions from there and is buried at the mission; his legacy is debated.
Robinson Jeffers: The poet of the Central California coast (1887-1962), who moved to Carmel in 1914, built Tor House, and is often called a pioneer of ecopoetry.
Rumsen Ohlone: The Ohlone people of the lower Carmel and Monterey area, who lived here for thousands of years and whose language, Rumsen, is being revived.
Whalers Cabin: A 1850s cabin at Whalers Cove in Point Lobos, built by Chinese fishermen and later used by Japanese and Portuguese fishermen and now a small museum.

Local Life & Customs

Carmel Pine Cone: Carmel’s weekly newspaper, published since 1915, covering local news, politics, arts and real estate.
Dog-friendly Carmel: Carmel is known for welcoming dogs: the beach allows off-leash dogs under voice control, and Doris Day ran one of the early pet-friendly hotels.
High-heel permit: A 1960s city ordinance requires a permit for walking public streets in tall, narrow heels; it is on the books but not seriously enforced.
No street numbers: For over a century Carmel’s homes had names and directions instead of street numbers; the city has now been moving to assign addresses, so check the current status.
Post office boxes: Carmel has no home mail delivery in the city, so residents collect mail from boxes at the downtown post office.
Village in a forest: Carmel’s planning idea: no streetlights, parking meters, traffic lights, chain restaurants or billboards, and new buildings designed around existing trees.

Nature & Wildlife

Carmel River Lagoon: A lagoon and wetland at the mouth of the Carmel River, part of Carmel River State Beach and a stop on the Central Coast Birding Trail.
Kelp forest: An underwater forest of large brown algae off Carmel and Point Lobos, among the most productive ecosystems on Earth and a draw for divers and kayakers.
Marine protected areas: Carmel Bay’s no-take and restricted zones, including Carmel Pinnacles and Point Lobos, created in 2007 to protect kelp forests, rocks and the canyon head.
Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary: A federally protected stretch of ocean from Marin County to Cambria, designated in 1992, that includes the waters off Carmel and Big Sur.
Monterey cypress: A wind-shaped evergreen that grows wild only at Point Lobos and Cypress Point, a few miles from Carmel, and is planted around the world.
Monterey pine: The fast-growing pine native to a few spots on California’s Central Coast, which is now widely planted for timber and threatened at home by pine pitch canker.
Point Lobos: A state natural reserve just south of Carmel, famous for Monterey cypress, rocky coves, kelp forests and some of the richest marine life in California.
Sea otter: A small marine mammal that rests floating in kelp and uses rocks as tools; a keystone species that protects kelp forests by eating sea urchins.

Places

17-Mile Drive: A scenic loop road through Pebble Beach and the Del Monte Forest, laid out in the 1890s for guests of the Hotel Del Monte and now mostly owned by Pebble Beach Company.
Big Sur: The rugged stretch of coast south of Carmel where the Santa Lucia Mountains drop straight into the Pacific, reached by the winding Highway 1.
Bixby Bridge: A graceful 1932 concrete arch bridge 13 miles south of Carmel on Highway 1, one of the most photographed bridges in California.
Carmel Beach: The white-sand city beach at the foot of Ocean Avenue, known for dogs off-leash under voice control and a no-wood-fire rule.
Carmel Point: The cape at the southern edge of Carmel-by-the-Sea, outside the city limits, with views of Carmel Bay, the river mouth and Point Lobos, and the site of Tor House.
Carmel Valley: The Carmel River valley east of Highway 1, a mostly unincorporated area of ranches, vineyards and villages inland from the city of Carmel.
Carmel-by-the-Sea: A one-square-mile village on the Monterey Peninsula, incorporated in 1916 and known for its cottages, trees and art-colony past. Locals and maps usually shorten it to Carmel.
Devendorf Park: The small central park on the block of Ocean Avenue and Junípero Street, developed by the city in 1932 and used for Carmel’s outdoor community events.
Forest Theater: An outdoor amphitheater founded in 1910, one of the oldest outdoor theaters west of the Rocky Mountains, set in a wooded hollow in Carmel.
Hawk Tower: The four-story stone tower Robinson Jeffers built beside Tor House between 1920 and 1924, shaped by his wife Una’s wishes and used as a writing room.
Highway 1 to Big Sur: The coast highway south of Carmel, built 1919-1937 partly by prison labor, and now a National Scenic Byway through Big Sur.
Mission Ranch: A historic ranch, hotel and restaurant near Carmel Mission, bought by Clint Eastwood in 1986 and restored in the style of its original farm buildings.
Ocean Avenue: Carmel’s main street, which runs from the village center down toward Carmel Beach and lines up its shops, galleries, courtyards and Devendorf Park.
Pebble Beach: A private residential and resort community in the Del Monte Forest between Monterey and Carmel, best known for its golf links and for the 17-Mile Drive.
Scenic Road: The road along the bluff above Carmel Beach, with its Scenic Pathway for walking, and posted parking limits.
Sunset Center: Carmel’s main performing-arts hall, built from the old Sunset School and home to the Carmel Bach Festival.
Tor House: The stone home on Carmel Point that the poet Robinson Jeffers began building in 1919 and lived in with his family until 1999; now a museum and a National Historic Landmark.