The Historic & Charming Mountain Town of Julian, California – What to See, Eat & Do

The Historic & Charming Mountain Town of Julian, California – What to See, Eat & Do

checking off a bucket list item We recently 
caught our very first Cubs spring training game in Mesa Arizona [kid: “Is that real?” Dad: “yeah that’s 
real yeah”] Then it was off to Yuma where we played our very first real game of pickle ball 
with our friends Barry and Nancy Nice Hey nice Way in the kitchen Oh you were in the kitchen 
Yeah we can review it You were in the kitchen I can edit it And from there we made our way to 
Palm Springs where Michelle got her hands on her favorite coconut cream pie from Sherman’s Deli 
There it is in all its glory Thank you to our one of our viewers John Bradley who left 
uh one of these gift cards here for us for when we came back by and that was very nice Very 
very nice Of course I’m going to celebrate with pie It’s always worth the wait But today we’re 
venturing out of the Coachella Valley to explore a historic little mountain town known for 
a very different kind of pie Stopped here for some diesel fuel before we take off Today we’re going 
to head to Julian California for a little history And of course some pie They have some of the 
best pie around Maybe in the state I don’t know [music: “We look to the mountain… We don’t care if it’s only a dream 
Nothing is really what it seems anyway Now little by little in the twilight gentle flow 
in the dance of fading light we grow Julian California famous for its old school 
charm and its legendary apple pie To be honest I had no idea this was such a touristy 
little town No we did not I just thought it was known for the Julian pies and that was 
it But my goodness there’s hardly anywhere to park That is a little pie shop there Yeah 
it’s a lot smaller than that one uh down the road that we went by That was the one we went 
to first time about 6 years ago I know it was Can you believe it’s been that long a long time 
ago Wow Well let’s looking for a place to park Can’t believe how busy this is I can’t believe 
how cold Yes people look very cold because it’s 40 some degrees up here Um I’m going to have 
to put um shoes on instead of sandals and uh a coat Brace yourselves for this 
What i am going to put jeans on We had to park in this lot here 
They charge $10 and $20 for an RV but he gave it to us for $10 So since 
we’re smaller Um all right Well there’s hardly anywhere to park I wonder if 
they got something special going on today I think they know she’s coming Pie 
girl Looks like we’re going to start the day with pie Pie before history Have to 
We have to She says sticker pole Man that food smells good We were here Here We were 
here and this is the way we came We saw we ate pie This is the way for We didn’t We 
hope we haven’t eaten pie yet I know Hope so Cool little town My fear is that they 
won’t have slices left They’d have whole pot pies That would be my fear cuz I don’t 
want to That’s your fear I don’t want a whole And the line is not as long as when we drove by 
Nestled in the mountains just an hour east of San Diego Julian California is more than just 
a charming small town It’s a slice of the past preserved in time Founded during the gold rush 
of the 1870s Julian still carries the spirit of the Old West in its wooden storefronts and 
historic landmarks But these days people come here for a different kind of treasure Apple thie 
Julian’s elevation and crisp mountain air make it perfect for apple orchards 47 And the town 
has fully embraced its pie fame And of course we couldn’t leave without having a slice Too 
cold And a cider donut Here she is the pie girl officially taste testing Julian’s most talked 
about dessert Is it worth the hype let’s just say it’s not called the pie capital of Southern 
California for nothing It’s very good Of course Nine and a half stars apple pie It’s very good 
Nine and a half That’s good Apple pie I’m happy with just the apples I’m happy with it all My 
gosh that apple is like very very very cooked very soft They’re known for the apple pie I mean 
for the apples Julian apples Wow that’s so good Cider donut with maple frosting Well I think we hit that about right 
Look at that line now back there All right Well all right That was very good 
Oh yes Worth a worth a trip just to come up here for that Worth a two-hour 
drive to some people We’re going to walk around a little town here Lot 
of little cute eating places and shops This is so weird that we just left uh 70° 
weather and drove up 2 hours and it’s 45 I know that says Wrong Branch Restaurant That 
sounds like a Chinese restaurant Wrong Branch Restaurant We getting groceries We talked to a gal who works in 
the grocery store She said uh that they are having a lot of the Pacific 
Coast Trail hikers coming through So um might be quite a few of those that we 
would see But but she did say it’s usually busier than this Yeah So this is normal for 
a weekend A lot of people probably thought it was going to snow and so they come up here to 
seek that as well But not us No snow just cold Long before apple pies and mountain day 
trippers Julian was a land quietly waiting to be discovered In the mid 1800s two European 
settlers Cockney Bill Williams and John Wesley Harold were among the first outsiders to 
arrive But it was in 1869 after the Civil War that the real story of Julian began to 
take shape There’s your store the old goat A group of travelers heading toward Arizona 
stopped in these hills and never left One of them Drury Bailey looked around and said 
“This is it.” They named the town Julian not after Bailey but after his cousin Mike Julian because 
as legend has it Mike was the better looking one Putting a microchip in each pup so that 
we can identify them later on when we tra those guys and we’ve seen a very high level 
of success That same year a freed slave named AE Fred Coleman spotted a glint of gold in 
the creek now named after him With a frying pan in hand he confirmed what would become 
California’s next great gold rush Hundreds poured into the hills Tent cities turned 
into timber homes And on George Washington’s birthday in 1870 the first hard rock mining 
claim was filed The Washington Mine feels so good Julian grew fast Mining towns popped by 
nearby Branson City Eastwood Coleman City but none rivaled Julian’s boom There was even talk of 
making Julian the new county seat of San Diego But Julian wasn’t built on gold alone In the same 
era James Madison arrived hauling young apple trees in a wagon The mountain air clear and cool 
was perfect The orchards took root and apple pie would eventually become Julian’s most beloved 
treasure Since James Madison first brought the first apple trees to Julian in the early 
1870s Julian apples have won many blue ribbons at places like the Chicago World’s Fair of 1893 
the St Louis Fair and the San Francisco World’s Fair of 1915 The first Julian Apple Celebration 
was held in 1909 but wasn’t followed by another until 1949 Julian also became home to many freed 
African-Ameans after the Civil War In fact in the 1880 census over half of all black residents 
in San Diego County lived right here Time is it how did he build that road i wonder and shovels 
and probably powder That’s a long ways Local lore says he had Indian labor which you can believe 
because he was already pals But the other thing that makes it believable too is everybody and 
their brother would have been up here picking and shoveling looking for gold Labor might have been 
hard to find but again we don’t know the story Very few diaries or journals exist uh that give 
you an idea of everyday life of what people did Just a short stroll from Julian’s main street 
tucked beneath the shade of old oaks sits one of the town’s quiet treasures the Julian Pioneer 
Museum This isn’t a flashy attraction There are no neon signs or long lines But step inside and it’s 
like opening a time capsule from the 1800s Built in 1914 as the town’s blacksmith shop the modest 
stone building now holds the soul of Julian’s early days Every room tells a story of grit 
survival and everyday life In this rugged mountain town you’ll find old mining tools antique clothing 
and rooms set up just like homes once were There’s a school room frozen in time and photographs of 
people who gave Julian its name its spirit and its legacy Each piece is donated by local families 
Each artifact has a story And the volunteers many of them grew up right here and they’ll gladly 
tell you more than any sign ever could If you’re walking through Julian and want to slow down and 
truly understand this place the museum is worth the stop Hey Michelle you want your hair curled 
no really Get your hair curled right over there Is she getting her hair curled or an electric chair 
that’s what it looks like Oh my goodness Well I remember seeing these My My mom had some for my 
grandma I think Just above the town of Julian where the trees grow tall and the wind whispers 
through the pines you’ll find the Julian Pioneer Cemetery For over 50 years grave sites on this 
hill were inaccessible to wagons In 1896 Mary Klo died during a storm It took 16 men to drag a sled 
bearing her casket from their church through 3 ft of snow to her grave Carrying coffins up this 
walk was discontinued about 1924 when vehicle access to the cemetery from a street was completed 
The walk became a public access easement in 1991 This is where the town’s first settlers miners and 
trailblazers now rest names like Bailey Julian and Coleman the very people who gave this mountain 
town its roots Each headstone tells part of the town’s story Some weathered and leaning with age 
others well-kept with flowers from descendants who still return It’s not a big cemetery but it’s 
rich in meaning You’ll see graves from Civil War veterans freed slaves and pioneers who chased gold 
Some who found it and some who never did Their lives were hard but they helped shape what Julian 
would become Oh Atlanta It’s so cold It’s amazing when you uh don’t live in the cold weather anymore 
How cold seems cold seems 40° and Oh my god It’s the wind I keep saying it’s the wind that’s 
making it Yeah right That’s what we were doing Wow Not a very wide road No No it isn’t Where are we going to park guy came out and 
told us just to park here He said that truck isn’t going anywhere and that road’s 
closed So we were able to park there cuz as you can see the parking lot’s 
pretty full All right they’re going to close here before long So I think 
hopefully we made it just in time There’s a group that just went in there 
a little bit ago He said you can go ahead and go through yourself uh self-guided 
and then catch up with them and end up back here and they’ll teach you how to 
pan for gold or we can wait for the next group So we decided just to go ourselves 
and catch up with that group Yep Yep So we’re doing it Yeah we’re doing it Okay 
you go first We’re going in the mine Yeah Oh Deep beneath the surface of Julian’s peaceful 
mountain town lies a story carved in stone and gold Interesting Oh you actually have to duck At the Eagle Mining Company you don’t just learn 
history You walk straight into it This isn’t a museum with displays behind glass It’s a real 
restored 1870s gold mine The original tunnels the old tools the cool air in the dark It all 
feels like stepping back into the days when gold fever swept through these hills Miners 
back then didn’t have machines or lights just picks candles and hope They chased narrow 
veins of gold through solid rock working long hours for just a few flakes Life was tough 
but this mine helped put Julian on the map Today guided tours take you through the 
actual shafts those miners dug by hand You’ll see how they crushed rock sifted 
for gold and survived underground with little more than grit and determination See the 
sparkles climbing the stairs out on both sides Uh when the orcart is has a load of rock in 
it if he doesn’t reach the jump hole before the the the bombs go off every type of mining was 
where it’s blasting tunnels in And they all had a a honeypot like this for the potty And um they 
all had this tradition about that bucket If any of the miners had a clumsy day and accidentally 
knocked that over into the tunnel can you imagine what that would smell like it would be horrible 
and they’re way too busy to do cleanup They’re just gonna stomp through this yucky puddle the 
rest of the day So uh when the work is done at the end of the day they’re not gonna let that guy 
get away with it The whole mine crew is going to grab him and drag him off behind a building for 
a talk Honey do you need to stop at the honey pot hidden beneath Julian’s quiet streets it’s a 
reminder that even the calmst towns can have stories forged in struggle hope and a little 
bit of gold Shake it for about 4 seconds side to side little rapidly Move the gold beneath the 
sand Right Uhhuh Uh-huh And then you go like this opposite the ridges and graceful motion like this 
opposite the ridges I’m using the turbulence of the water to create a whirlpool to lift the sand 
And then every I’ I’d recommend every five or six times you move it you want to shake it too Two 
different techniques That way you’ll settle the goal back It tries to climb out So shake it up and 
then go right back to this graceful motion Thank you Developing your skills huh all right Good 
work youngster You did find some Does require patience right so shake and scoop I haven’t demoed 
in this drop yet today Let’s see how it pans out Get it Pan Can’t believe I did that on accident 
Better if it doesn’t sound stage Okay so I did exactly what I told the kid not to do at a loss I 
saw I saw one idea for trying to lecture someone Oh there was one Hey would you like to teach this 
guy how to paint sorry to be so philosophical I guess that’s the secret to life right finesse 
Easier said than done Not a lot to it but it was an interesting mind tour Yeah And it was $30 
and I think 50 something like that for two people Yeah And then they teach you how to pay in for 
gold at the end which we saw the gold flakes But yeah we did It is getting dark quick because 
it’s very cloudy We heard somebody say that uh it was there was a possibility of snow today 
We really don’t want to be going down the mountain in the snow So I think we’re going to take the 
long route back going through Tmacula Maybe find a good place to eat Should we eat at the other 
cafe here in town or go on to Oldtown Tmacula or Or do you want to wait for Sherman’s Deli 
no I mean we’ve we’ve believe it or not been to Sherman’s I think at least four times already 
Five Julian Cafe and Bakery or the Julian Beer Company up here Beer You want a beer no I do 
not Julian Market in Delhi But what’s funny is we were parked there earlier across That’s where 
we paid the $10 all day Yeah So we got the Italian restaurant Oh the Chinese restaurant No wrong 
branch Wrong branch It’s not Chinese Call it a day Let’s cate Don’t forget to subscribe to our channel 
click that little bell and hit that thumbs up See you next week

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The Historic & Charming Mountain Town of Julian, California – What to See, Eat & Do
(EP 349)

ℹ️ About this episode:
Step back in time with us as we explore the charming mountain town of Julian, California — a place known for its rich Gold Rush history, beautiful scenery, and of course, legendary apple pie.
In this video, we take you on a walk through Julian’s historic streets, stop for a slice of famous pie, visit local landmarks like the Pioneer Museum, the Eagle Mining Co., and the Julian Pioneer Cemetery, and share what makes this little town so unforgettable.

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