Alice Keck Park Memorial Gardens

Wow… just wow… Having sold plants for a paycheck for four years, it’s still amazing to see these plants somewhere other than an uneventful one or five gallon sized black grower pot and price tags. The vegetation is dutifully maintained, and the turtles are cool as hell. However, I feel that it should be more educational and have more signage (other than in one little butterfly plant area) with the plant names. I walked around and named off the majority of them myself, but if I hadn’t worked in the retail plant business, I’d have no clue what they were and there may be someone walking around that park who would be interested in knowing what some of these plants are names so they can go to their local nursery and find one or ask a salesperson about getting one so they can enjoy it themselves in their own backyard.

Visited downtown Santa Barbara in search of dog-​friendly places and found this park. Great place for an easy and relaxing walk. There are even informational audio boxes that you can sit and listen to if you want to learn more about the garden.
This location is also next to a public park that was filled with kids even on a weekday. Will be returning next time I am in Santa Barbara!

Such a beautiful park. I spent quite a bit of time here watching the turtles and ducks in the pond. Really enjoyed all the flowers and trees in the area. Highly recommend for photos, or just a relaxing day at the park.

Beautiful magical oasis. Adjacent to an incredible children’s playground. Don’t miss it.

Come on, people! It’s a park and not even an exceptional one at that. After reading the rave reviews, I was expecting to be wowed. The location is pretty cool. I’m all for green space in an … ahem, urban environment. In Santa Barbara, this means it is a couple of blocks from State Street.
Maybe I visited during the wrong time of year. I bet it looks different in spring. There are paths that take you all around the park, by the pond and lead to the center where there are a few great big trees. According to the map, there is a sundial but I didn’t find it.
I was curious about the metal boxes scattered around the park. Each box had a large metal button (like the old crosswalk buttons that «make the light say WALK») and just below, there was a metal mesh that looked like a speaker. I pressed one and leaned in close hoping to hear a representative of the parks and rec department tell me about the nature that surrounded me, but nothing happened. I pressed all the buttons, but nothing happened. I even leaned in and yelled «hello?» but nothing happened.
So three stars for Alice Keck. Like I said earlier, the gardens probably look gorgeous in the Spring when the sun is shining and the flowers are blooming. I would like to see the city pour a little money into restoring this park to its original glory and then I would be happy to give it five stars.

How can someone NOT give this place 5 stars? It’s incredibly beautiful and relaxing! I packed a picnic and we ate it on the grass enjoying the beauty of the pond.
the place just has a beautiful feel to it. one relaxes and even naps listening to the bird chirping.
the only downside of this place is that if you stand too close to the pond, you can smell the nasty odor from the dirty water. =/​yuck.

Who effin knew Santa Barbara has a gorgeous park !!! Not only is it a sensory park, with a kickass pond in the center, it’s also a butterfly garden !!! What is a butterfly garden you ask?!? At first, I just thought tons of butterflies were flying around because gorgeous parks tend to have gorgeous things !! But nope, there’s a sign that states the plants in the park are deliberately placed as food for the growth of butterflies and caterpillars !!

I love this little park! It is such an adorable little place. I have been coming here forever and when my daughter was born I started taking her here and she just absolutely loved it, watching the little turtles and stuff. Sometimes I will just come out here and bring a lunch and sit on the Grass and chill and watch people and it’s just a great little spot in the sunshine! Play little bit of Jack Johnson on my headphones and I could probably sit here all day!

Santa Barbara really has some lovely outdoor spaces and the memorial Garden is certainly one of them! I come here to walk my dog, sit and think or picnic and it is always so peaceful and relaxing with the combination of beautiful flowers and trees and serene water.
There are so many little books and crannies to sit and read or think or a bunch of paths to explore if you’re like me and need to be moving.
In terms of wildlife, obviously there are ducks and various birds, but look out for turtles in the pond and on the rocks as well. The butterflies that are drawn to the place because of the butterfly habitat come in a wide array of colors and are certainly a sight to be seen.

So much fun… love the ducks and turtles.
Great gazebo and little island.
The little nooks and cute crannies make it a sweet secret garden.
Fun to take a picnic or even just a book or magazine and zen out!

We didn’t expect to see this, as we stumbled upon it on a drive. We love this beautiful garden and the children’s park across the way.

Alice Keck Park is such a nice place to visit. I like going here with a cup of coffee and just watching all the turtles and ducks. There are plenty of places to sit and it shouldn’t be hard finding a shaded spot under all the plants and trees around here. Its just great. Or you can just sit on one of the random giant rocks near the pond.
The highlight of the park, to me, is the pond. There are literally dozens of turtles just swimming about. Best of all, if you go near the water, they just SWARM YOU! Well, sort of swarm. They actually just sloooowly swim to you in a large group (hoping that you’ll feed them).
One of my friends introduced this place to me while I was down in a rut. And man… I was just blown away. Since then, I’ve taken my brother and his family here so that my niece could feed the turtles. Well… she tried to at least. All the ducks kept stealing the food away from them. But regardless, we had a good time.

Great park. Loaded with red eared turtles ducks and fish. I actually just released two red eared sliders today if anyone happens to see them let me know if they are still doing well. See pictures which makes my turtles easy to spot. The markings will come off next time they shed their shell.

It’s a beautiful park. Some lovely flowers, nice smelling ones like the honeysuckle and vanilla-​scented heliotropes. Great family place. Kids have lots of fun around the pond, filled with lily pads n turtles. My BF said there used to be Kois in that pond but I didn’t see any. Just kinda dirty and infested with box turtles. I say infested Cuz there’s too many of them, made my skin crawl. Plus a lot of their shells were covered in algae.
Other than that, a good place for pictures n to chill.
Fyi, I accidentally posted the vids for Alice Keck park under Santa Barbara Unilocal page. So check those out there.

I’m very impressed with this public park. If we had something like this in LA, the plants would be trampled and plants picked. SB does a great job with maintaining the park, and situated in a nice quiet neighborhood. I loved the wide array of plants and the layout of the gardens.
I was in love with all the turtles in and around the pond, and some laying on the lily pads.
We parked on the street and walked most of the park. Great place for photos and very relaxing to walk around.

What an awesome little park in downtown Santa Barbara. During my last trip to Santa Barbara a few weeks ago, I had a few hours to kill. I pulled out my trusty Unilocal app to look for something to do near by that was free, and Alice Keck Memorial Park popped up. It wasnt too far from the main downtown attractions and so I knew it would be a quick walk or drive there.
The park was really beautiful, even in winter (when I went). The park, which features plants that grow well in the Mediterranean climate, is divided into a few sections including a sensory garden, a pond, and a succulents garden section. The sensory garden was cool, which apparently was designed for those who had visual impairments. The sensory garden features plants with strong scents or contrasting textures to allow people with any visual impairments to enjoy the garden using their other senses. The pond is also really cute – lots of shorebirds and waterfowl come here to get some water and be fed. Don’t forget about the turtles – there are probably hundreds of them. If you don’t see the turtles, you’re on the wrong side of the pond –walk around until you find them (I found them near the mini gazebo). Lastly, the succulent gardens were super cool since not many places around the world feature these types of plants as part of a garden. I had recently read a book on succulent gardens in California, and I believe Alice Keck was featured in the book!
As mentioned before, Alice Keck is very close to the main downtown attractions (about a 15 min walk from Figueroa and State Sts). For those driving, there is ample 2 hour parking and no time limit parking as well. Since Alice Keck is in a residential area, there are street sweeping schedules to be mindful of.
Alice Keck is a great little hidden gem in the downtown Santa Barbara area that offers visitors and locals alike a great place to walk, chill, or learn about nature. Best of all it’s free, conveniently located near downtown, and parking is easy! 5 stars.

I just have a simple question, are there turtles here year around?
I would love to bring my GF here the second weekend of October while we are there and would like to know. So if anyone can let me know that would be great!

The Alice Keck Memorial Garden is of Santa Barbara’s hidden gems. The Alice Keck Park Memorial Gardens is right across the street (E. Micheltorena Street) from Alameda Park in the downtown Santa Barbara area.
Note: do be careful about which street you choose to park on because the street cleaning around here is during lunchtime hours. Just when you want to stop by and enjoy your lunch in a secluded and restful park setting is when they are coming by to clean the streets.
This darling gem features a Koi Pond with LOADS of turtles swimming and sunning themselves on the water lily large leaves. You’ll see all sized of turtle from babies, to parents and the matriarch and patriarch turtles.
Many of the plants are labeled, making it easy to find your favorites and possibly shop for something like them when you go home.
Additionally, you will find green metal standing boxes with a single large grey metal button. Lean on it and press it firmly. Some of them still work. These are talking tour guides describing and educating the park crawler on the plants and wildlife in that particular cluster.
They laced this special park with a number of marvelous benches where you can sit and enjoy your lunch break and share it accompanied by some hopeful ducks off of the Koi pond. A few of the benches are bit more secluded, with small clusters of trees offering romantic couples the option to sit, nuzzle and neck.
A positive delight. We will definitely be returning here again on future visits.

We stopped here on our way up to San Simeon and it was such a nice little stop to stretch and walk around. They have a cute butterfly garden and there are ducks, turtles, humming birds, and butterflies all over the park. It looks great for picnics!

This might be my shortest review ever, but simply said:
Who doesn’t love a free garden/​park?
There’s a nice pond with ducks, a nice walking path with flowers and greenery, a decently sized playground… There’s even easy and plentiful street parking!