Travel and Adventure by Various Travel Authors

It's the second largest city in the Los Angeles region and the fifth largest in California, yet it rarely gets much attention.

It deserves more because it boasts:

— The most romantic restaurant in Los Angeles County in 2008, according to an online AOL poll.

— An historic home that tells the 300-year-old story of California history.

— The only museum in the West that features contemporary Latin American art.

— Gondola tours of scenic residential canals.

— An amazing aquarium that helps coordinate national and international focus on ocean conservation issues.

— The Queen of the Atlantic, a "floating miracle."

Once known as a Navy town, this city's port today accepts 75 percent of all imports into the United States.

It's Long Beach, Calif., whose 5.5-mile-long beach with walking and biking path looks west to fabled Catalina Island 26 miles offshore.

With several neighborhoods filled with eclectic restaurants and shops, it is said you can go "around the world in 80 blocks" in Long Beach.

Belmont Shore hugs the coastline and is home to Second Street, a charming Mecca for outdoor dining and shopping. Lovely historic Craftsman homes are also here along Ocean Boulevard and First Street. Nearby Naples Island is home to those gondolas and canals.

Alamitos Bay holds the city's largest marina and lots of waterfront dining options. The East Village Arts District along Broadway offers several antique boutiques. On Fourth Street between Cherry and Junipero is Retro Row, where vintage clothing and furniture stores beckon.

Downtown's Pine Avenue is the center of 100 restaurants within eight blocks.

"Even though it's a big city, Long Beach feels like a community," says native and resident Nicole Davis, 24. "It's not haughty. It's not L.A. or Orange County. If you want to go out in sweats — go; if you want to dress up — go."

My friends and I dressed up just a little our first night to sample the nightlife.

We could easily see why the Sky Room, on top of the 18-story historic Breakers Hotel, has been a romantic destination restaurant since it opened in 1926. That AOL poll also named it the seventh most romantic restaurant in the United States. Every table and raised booth offers oceanfront views extending to Catalina, and the dance floor keeps couples on their toes with live Latin fusion bands.

From our base at the downtown Westin Long Beach hotel, we walked from one international cuisine to the next when we strolled along Pine Avenue to dine around the world. Starting with delectable Spanish tapas and the silky smooth Sangria Royale at Cafe Sevilla, where an upstairs nightclub is a city hot spot at 10 p.m., we moved on to mouth-watering Mediterranean delicacies at George's Greek Cafe and finished with a selection of decadent homemade Roman desserts at the lovely L'Opera in the historic Clock Tower Building.

The next day, after a very French breakfast at Creme de la Crepe in the East Village Arts District, we toured the fascinating Rancho Los Alamitos, one of two historic adobes (the other is Rancho los Cerritos) now owned and operated by the City of Long Beach.

"We can tell California's history here from the very beginning," docent Teresa Barbee told us during our guided tour.

The hilltop was sacred to the Tongva/Gabrielino people beginning around A.D. 500. In 1790, when California was still a part of Mexico, Manuel Nieto received 300,000 acres here in a Spanish land grant.

His heirs split Nieto's land into five great ranchos in 1806, one of which was the 28,500-acre Rancho Los Alamitos.

The Bixby family owned the rancho from 1881 until 1961; it was a working cattle ranch until 1952.

But when oil was discovered on Signal Hill in 1921, urban changes came quickly. The Bixby family gave the furnished house and gardens to the City of Long Beach in 1968. It's open Wednesday-Sunday, 1-5 p.m., and entry is free; pass through the guarded gate of its surrounding neighborhood during those hours.

The Bixbys transformed the adobe beginning in 1906. The 10,000-square-foot home remains a splendid example of adobe/Craftsman style and still looks as though the Bixby family will be home for dinner. Florence Bixby began an impressive art collection, which included original works by Monet, Cassat, Hassam to Frank Tenney Johnson oils and Remington sculptures.

And she hired famed landscape architects of the time, including the Olmsted brothers, sons of Frederick Law Olmsted who designed New York's Central Park. The 4-1/2 acres of gardens are filled with magnificent specimens today, including two 100-year-old Moreton Bay fig trees.

We were all impressed by MoLAA, the Museum of Latin American Art, and its collection of contemporary works from artists living and working in Central and South America since World War II. Its sculpture garden is particularly pleasing.

Lunch at the award-winning waterfront Parker's Lighthouse at Shoreline Village sated us until we sipped chardonnay on a real Italian gondola, gliding through the pricey residential canals of Naples Island.

A splendid dinner at the lovely La Traviata restaurant continued our immersion in Italy, Long Beach-style.

After enormous omelets at a locals' hangout, Omelet Inn, we hit the Aquarium of the Pacific where the three major regions of the world's largest ocean are featured in exhibits that house some 12,500 ocean animals. We petted sharks in Shark Lagoon, grinned at the antics of adorable sea otters, and marveled over the colorful collections of sea life in the Tropical Pacific tanks.

After excellent tea, sandwiches and cheesecakes at the Victorian-themed Vintage Tea Leaf, considered one of the best tearooms in the country, we wound up our visit with an exquisite dinner aboard the famed Queen Mary.

Cunard built her to be the biggest, fastest ocean liner of the time, and when she made her maiden voyage from England to New York in 1936, crowds gathered to see the "floating miracle." She holds one of the world's largest collections of original art deco artwork, and claims 56 different wood veneers on her walls and floors. Virtually every famous royal, politician and movie star of the day crossed the Atlantic during her service, which ended in 1967.

The City of Long Beach bought and opened her in 1971 as a hotel, restaurant and tour attraction.

As we dined in the elegant award-winning Sir Winston's dining room aboard the "Queen of the Atlantic," we gazed at the lights of Long Beach and toasted to the amazing sights we found there.

IF YOU GO

Three airports serve Long Beach: Long Beach, Los Angeles and John Wayne in Orange County.

Locate hotels, restaurants and shops, including all those mentioned, can be found on the website of the Long Beach Convention & Visitors Bureau: www.visitlongbeach.com; 800-452-7829.

Priscilla Lister is a freelance travel writer. To read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

COPYRIGHT 2009 CREATORS SYNDICATE INC.