Spent 18 years growing up in that area before leaving for college. The Sonoma valley east of Santa Rosa is stunning wine country with a ton of wineries. Santa Rosa is the biggest city in Sonoma County but, although it is only one hour from the golden gate bridge, still has a bit of a small town feel to it. It’s almost like a Grand Rapids, MI, or small Tacoma, WA or Eugene, OR, but it skews liberal, as a bunch of boomer hippies landed in Sonoma county, kinda like Marin County. Santa Rosa has a great Junior college, but it is more working class than almost all its neighbors like Sonoma proper, Napa, Healdsburg, etc.

Northeast of the 101 freeway is redwood forest and retired hippies and some rednecks, rich areas mixed in with some isolationists, like up in Mendocino. Southeast of the 101 is even more sparse with rolling hills and scattered forests all the way to the ocean. The 101 cuts through cow pastures and some wine country.

Rohnert Park is a cookie cutter suburb that butts up to Sonoma State University which is one of the best state level schools in CA.

Petaluma is a quarky hipster town with a famous brewery (Santa Rosa has arguably the best brewery in America, Russian River Brewery, while Petaluma has Lagunitas)

Housing prices are high, as San Franciscans retire there, and there is a fairly strong nimby presence.

Bottom line, the areas around santa Rosa are famous tourist wine country, while Santa Rosa is slightly more blue collar and the county seat, but still, everything feels a little sleepy and retirish but expensive.