Seal Beach is the first taste of Orange County that travelers get when they are driving down the coast. Just off the Pacific Coast Highway, visitors can catch a glance at the iconic wooden Seal Beach Pier and head straight to Main Street, which features dozens of shops and eateries along a picturesque strip that’s just a few blocks long. From the beach here, you can catch views of the Long Beach Harbor skyline. If you look to the southwest, you can see Catalina Island. These classic coastal landscapes are both particularly awesome at sunset.
Fun For Everyone
While the famous Seal Beach seals aren’t as common as they once were, visitors might get to see a few in less populated stretches of the coast they are more likely to congregate. And if you miss them, you can still say hello to Slick, the bronze statue of a coastal pinniped on the Seal Beach pier.
The Red Car Museum is a must for lovers of trains or transportation history buffs. This rescued tower car is a relic of the now-defunct rail car system that once connected the major cities in Southern California. The century-old Red Car is filled with artifacts from the time when it would have brought commuters from Orange County to Los Angeles. Start here and walk down Electric Avenue Median Park to the end of Seal Beach and then back to the pier and up Main Street. This makes for a great loop of Seal Beach’s greatest attractions and scenery.
An Outdoor Adventure
Seal Beach is surrounded by protected natural areas that are helping to restore the population of local wildlife. Los Cerritos Wetlands mostly lie in a neighboring section of Long Beach and is a protected habitat for many California birds.
The San Gabriel River Bike Trail runs along the San Gabriel River that separates Seal Beach from Los Angeles county. This 28-mile cyclist’s paradise covers undiscovered, peaceful tracks of Southern California ending at the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains.
In the southern part of the city, there is the Seal Beach National Wildlife Refuge, protected land set aside for wildlife in Anaheim Bay.
