Santa Cruz, a beach town with plenty of thrills.

COAST INTO A BEACH TOWN LIKE NO OTHER.

Saturday afternoon, the intersection of Cedar Street and Pacific Avenue, Santa Cruz. A woman has set up shop at a little fabric-draped table that resembles a fortune teller’s booth. Instead of a crystal ball, she has an old manual typewriter. Her sign promises that on it she will write you a poem.

A weathered, gray-haired guy lugging a weathered black guitar case and a black folding chair lumbers up. “I might want a poem,” he says to poetry woman. “How long are you here?”

“Two more weeks,” she says. “Then I’m in Toronto.”

“I’ll be back,” guitar guy says. He opens the black folding chair and sits down in it, opens his guitar case and pulls out his guitar and sets down his little velvet-lined box where people can toss in quarters and dollar bills. He begins to sing Neil Young, pretty well. Poetry woman starts typing. The man sings, the guitar plays, typewriter keys clatter percussion.

This is Santa Cruz. No place else has its swirl, its mix of redwoodshadowed, wave-washed natural beauty and its alchemic blend of residents and visitors — the surfers at Steamer Lane, the guitar strummers and sculptors, the UC Santa Cruz marine scientists, the gettingsunburned-crowds-screaming at the thrill rides on the Boardwalk, the solitary sunset hiker at Natural Bridges State Beach, peering out into Monterey Bay and thinking, Is that a whale? — and then answering, yes. What you realize once you’ve been here is that Santa Cruz is sui generis. It doesn’t remind you of other places. Other places remind you of Santa Cruz. If you’re lucky, the poetry woman will be on duty when you visit. But if she isn’t, no worries — Santa Cruz is its own poem.