Almar Shopping Center — Attraction in Santa Cruz

This shopping center is great! For the big-box, corporate palette, there is Safeway, Ace Hardware, Panda Express, Round Table, and Wingstop. For local fare they have Parish Pub. This is your pub-style food elevated slightly plus a vast selection of adult beverages to choose from. Weekdays can be mellow but if you like busy and loud, weekends are where it’s at. As for the shopping center, there is lots of parking. Just don’t do anything illegal in your car because I have seen lots of people get busted in this parking lot over the years. Oh yes, and now there is a nail salon...

Ace Hardware is the crown jewel of this strip mall. The nail place was a triple fiasco--so I don't recommend unless you like lousy mani-pedis. I used to think Ace was horribly overpriced. Not lately. I got a fab deal on a good space heater during our Artic Spell in Santa Cruz. Plus they have excellent customer service, which as locals know, is as precious as gold since most places are staffed with snotty philosophy majors resentfully reminding you that soon they won't have to do their lousy retail/customer jobs. I'm not sure how that's my fault--or any...

It was cool besides the security guard at Safeway we had a good time. There is a female security guard and for starters she sucks at her job. While we were shopping she was so focused on my boyfriend since he has face tattoos she didn't notice the guy in the next aisle putting bottles in his backpack. We could hear him he didn't even try to hide it because the stupid security guard was too fixated on my boyfriend to notice anything else. They need to get rid of her. Other than that it was a great place to shop they have a little...