HAPPY PLACE

There's happy, and then there's Huntington Beach happy. Named a top 10 happiest city in the entire country in 2019, this surf-centric  of 201,874 has the formula just right—balancing a diversified economy from aerospace to surf shops with strong schools and healthcare, plus an ocean-loving lifestyle along all 9.5 miles of its broad, wave-blessed sands full of community fire pits and volleyball courts. Emerging in 2019 from the 110th anniversary of its founding, Surf City U.S.A. heads into its second century with an expanded Junior Lifeguard program for younger locals, new facilities and services for veterans and seniors, and improved infrastructure and support of solar energy projects, among a long list of community-building goals. Happy, indeed.