[The kickoff post's here]

Main Street, Santa Monica’s somewhat less-touristy shopping and dining strip, begins just south of the tourist mecca that’s Third Street Promenade — though before you hit the main drag, you get all the pretty government buildings on their well-kept grassy lawns.

I stop by here once in a while to pick up guest parking permits — but one of these days I’m gonna go for Jazz on the Lawn, the concert series happening on the Santa Monica City Hall (1685 Main) lawn on Sundays. Next up — Nate Birkey, SoCal jazz man with a trumpet, performing this Sunday, Aug. 19, 2007, at 5 pm.

The first eco-restaurant you’ll see’s Euphoria Cafe, an organic, raw, vegan restaurant whose food I’ve tried at some Green Business Networking events — A little leafy for me, but I plan to visit the actual restaurant to try something beyond the raw wraps, which aren’t my thing.

Across the street’s the Santa Monica community farms, where some of my neighbors have little plots of land for growing veggies and flowers. I hear theres a years-long wait to nab one of these coveted plots –

Walk on and you’ll hit a whole string of more conventional (as in cooked) restaurants with good organic options: Mani’s Bakery (which has a different owner than the original Fairfax branch, thus the inferior menu in Santa Monica) and Urth Caffe (which gets its fairly-traded coffee roasted by Thanksgiving Coffee up north but likes to brag about roasting its own coffee).

Get even more coffee at the teeny Groundwork Coffee branch (again with fairly-traded, yet uncertified, coffee), then cool off with Ben & Jerry’s (self-explanatory, I think).

As for eco-shopping: Yoga Works has some nice organic Ts and tanks and other yogawear, and Natural High Lifestyle boasts casual beachy hemp and bamboo clothes.

Patagonia offers not only organic and recycled sportswear but organic jeans and more dressy stuff these days, and even Planet Blue carries some organic cotton Loomstate Ts — and as I discovered on Monday — the Worldchanging book!

Organic salads are pretty much de rigeur at many of the restaurants, perhaps because on Sundays, Main Street has a very popular farmers’ market. Step into The Library Alehouse for 29 beers on draught with fresh organic salads — I might take the Beer Activist here when he comes into town in a few weeks — or Panini Garden for more organic salads.

Main Street has its clubs and bars too, of course: Mor, Circle Bar, Finn McCool’s, and many others, so the strip’s especially busy on Fri and Sat nights. World Cafe’s one of my fave places for happy hour here — though the place really has no eco-claim, except that it’s shaded by lotsa trees…. Eco-cooling?

And at the southern edge of Santa Monica’s One Life Natural Foods Market — a bit pricy, but with great organic options and a yummy juice bar.

If you’re tired from the walk, go around the corner on Pier to hang out at Novel Cafe — Sit for hours drinking more Groundwork Coffee –

Comments