Three of California’s beaches were listed in a new book about the top 100 beaches around the world, with 14 total included from the United States.
Pfeiffer Beach in Big Sur, El Matador State Beach in Malibu, and Venice Beach in Los Angeles were listed in the book “Best Beaches: 100 of the World’s Most Incredible Beaches” released by Lonely Planet, a travel guide book publisher, in February.
“Our intent in creating Lonely Planet’s Best Beaches was to assemble a beautiful and informative collection of 100 of the world’s most incredible beaches that are worthy of putting on your travel agenda. This is not a list of the best ‘swimming beaches’ in the world but instead a much more varied list where the beaches range from easy to access to super remote (there’s a beach in Antarctica, for instance),” Chris Zeiher, a Lonely Planet spokesperson, told California Insider.
In the book, exquisitely beautiful beaches of azure, emerald, and aquamarine waters are interspersed with beaches full of wildlife, nature, and people.
“The book is oriented into six geographical sections. There’s no numerical or alphabetical order to the beaches in each geographical section. The order of the book was actually dictated by the gorgeous images and how they orient on the page—so the flow of the book was the most important aspect in assembling it,” Mr. Zeiher added.
When asked about what makes this book different from others, Mr Zeiher replied, “When assembling the list we constantly asked ourselves, ‘Is this beach worth including on your travel itinerary?’ So, this makes our list very different.”
At the back of the book, five beaches are listed in each of nine categories, ranging from the top beaches for snorkeling, to see wildlife, to see nature, to people-watch, and the best family-friendly beaches, among others.
“The ‘Top 5 Best Beaches for’ lists contained at the back of the book were created by the team who put the title together—they created these as a cross-reference [for] the best experiences to have at each beach,” Mr. Zeiher explained.
Pfeiffer Beach in Big Sur is one of the top five beaches to watch the sunset. Venice Beach is included in the top five beaches to people-watch.
Three U.S. beaches were listed in the top five beaches to see wildlife, including Playa Tortuga (Turtle Beach) at Isla Culebrita in Puerto Rico, Ruby Beach at Olympic National Park in Washington, and Assateague Island National Seashore in Maryland and Virginia.
Trunk Bay in Saint John, the U.S. Virgin Islands, was listed as one of the top five beaches for snorkeling.
Other top beaches in the United States are Driftwood Beach at Golden Isles in Georgia, Grayton Beach at Grayton Beach State Park in Florida, South Beach at Miami Beach in Florida, Cannon Beach in Oregon, Sand Harbor at Lake Tahoe in Nevada, Hanalei Bay in Kaua’i in Hawaii, and Oneloa Beach (Big Beach) in Maui in Hawaii.
