Bodega, CA

Bodega is a Sonoma County census-designated place in the inland hills, about five miles from the Pacific coast and separate from the coastal community of Bodega Bay. The 2020 census counted 134 residents. Bodega School is part of Shoreline Unified, and the village's small historic core includes the Bodega Country Store, St. Teresa of Avila Church, and the Potter Schoolhouse. County roads connect the village to coastal Highway 1, dairy country, and the larger Sonoma region.

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Coast Miwok people lived in the watershed long before the 1840s settlement. James Watson opened a general store in 1852, St. Teresa's was built in 1859, and the Potter Schoolhouse followed in 1873. Alfred Hitchcock used the village for much of The Birds in 1962, putting the church, schoolhouse, and store into film history. Much of the surrounding land remains ranch and dairy country. Bodega remains a small inland village of farms, church and school landmarks, and a name that is often confused with the bay five miles west.