UCSC is great! I transferred here from Cabrillo which is the local CC but I moved from Sacramento before that. I have been to other UCs and UCSC is definitely my favorite campus. It's beautiful, secluded, and the weather is amazing. The social life on campus is very good, it really depends on major. I'm a ENVS student so I'm working on the farm a lot and I have met many friends here. I would say if you decide to move here you MUST experience off campus life and live off campus. I can't tell you how many students live in Santa Cruz yet know nothing about the town. Santa Cruz is an incredibly unique town and has a very exclusive local scene, the people here really dislike the school and students in general. UCSC has been very problematic for the local community and has driven up housing prices and increased the price of basically everything. Don't let that scare you though. The reason I am close with the local community is because I spent a lot of my childhood here with my Uncle's family. Anyway, the school is great, professors are great, campus is amazing, dining halls are terrible, real estate is incredibly expensive (moved to SC with 10k in savings and no debt, 5 years later am now in 5k debt and have almost no savings), social life is good and off campus community is amazing.

TL;DR Coolest of the UCs, don't come here if you're not interested in experiencing off campus culture