Santa Barbara - this site's home page has neat lists of links for each of the following categories: lodging, dining, weddings, activities, community, attractions, family, and festivals; beaches page includes photos and capsule descriptions of 10+ beaches; family pages have a list of family-friendly restaurants; community page has a virtual tour, santabarbara.com

Santa Barbara: The American Riviera - this site enables you to customize your search, for example if you want to shop you go to that list and then search by category antiques, jewelry, etc.; if you want to eat you check out the categories, from coffee to Mediterranean to steakhouses, and so on, santabarbaraca.com

Downtown Santa Barbara - this web site lets visitors know what is downtown from art to farmers markets, from parking and getting around to State Streets themed flags, santabarbaradowntown.com

Visit Santa Barbara - comprehensive listings, but without details, plus an events calendar, sbchamber.org

Santa Barbara Vacations & Tourism - top user-rated hotels and B&Bs plus reviews, top attractions and dining, articles and guidebooks, deals, and forums, tripadvisor.com

City of Santa Barbara Visitors - site links to maps (including an interactive map to parks), airport info, and a good list of waterfront activities--from biking to whale watching, santabarbaraca.gov

Santa Barbara California Vacation Travel Reviews - Currently has links to four good articles about Santa Barbara, etravelreviews.com

Mission Santa Barbara - the "queen of the missions," founded in 1782 has a stone facade patterned after a Roman temple and features twin bell towers; it has been occupied by the Franciscans since its founding; this site is all about the mission as part of California history, californiamissions.com; see also Mission Tour for a virtual tour and tripadvisor for details of how to visit, plus traveler reviews and photos

Santa Barbara Museum of Art - has a range of collections: antiquities, Asian, European, American, modern & contemporary, and photography; current exhibits are Chinese lacquer masterpieces and picture stories, sbmuseart.org

The Santa Barbara Botanic Garden - rare and indigenous plants on 65 acres in Mission Canyon; gardens offer self-guided walks and theme tours; docent-guided tours are also offered daily, sbbg.org