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Good advice IMO. I personally love camping within a few hours drive on the weekends, kiteboarding (SF Bay and the Delta have world-class kiteboarding conditions), sailing, mountain biking, hiking, and some rock climbing. The weather is my idea of perfect with sun almost every day and no snow ever (I grew up with snow about 6 months of the year, and I'd personally find it hard to ever go back to that).

Lake Tahoe is also great for skiing compared to where I grew up, which had almost no hills and no ocean.

SF is great for clubbing and bars etc. I love that the people here are generally very chill and loving. The outdoor music festivals in CA are also fantastic if you're into that sort of thing.

For me at least, the rent is kind of just the cost of having an enjoyable life in the US. San Jose is crazy expensive for a suburb, but it's worth it for me because of all there is to do out here. The Valley is where tech happens, and as long as I'm in it as a career and as an interest, I'm happy to be at the epicenter. That it's in California, the place I grew up dreaming about, is the icing on the cake for me.

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To provide a counterpoint, as someone who lived in Silicon Valley forever and still owns a place there, one of the reasons I moved away is that it is too far from good outdoor activities. Good mountains are 3-4 hours away, and while I made that trek on hundreds of weekends, it was far from optimal; I also hiked the hills around the Bay Area frequently but that isn't even close to the same. Similarly, the ocean around the Bay Area is okay but not great; no one would ever confuse it with Southern California, it has more in common with the Oregon coast.

By contrast, where I currently live (Seattle) is 45 minutes from the Cascades which has fantastic hiking, backpacking, etc (better than the Sierra Nevada in some ways) and a much more pervasive boating culture than exists in the Bay Area thanks to the history and geography of the region. Living here has made a high-quality outdoor lifestyle much more viable than it ever was in the Bay Area because the logistics are so much easier.

The tech scene in the Bay Area is unparalleled, but if you removed that aspect, there isn't that much to recommend a suburb like San Jose from a lifestyle standpoint. The South Bay in particular also doesn't have the mild weather of the peninsula and San Francisco -- it is more Fresno than San Diego.

The cloud cover in Seattle from November to March and the unpredictable sunny days make it a torture if you are not heads down in your work (indoor). The rest of the year and great surroundings make it up a bit.

I agree Seattle has a lot going for it, but the weather is simply unbearable for me. Yes, the outdoor activities are fantastic, but it's kind of pointless when it's cold and wet nine months out of the year.

When I was a student at UW, there was a really nice hiking trail that started literally outside my house. I must have utilized it three, maybe four times over the six years I was there. It's like you wake up in the morning, look out the window and see its overcast (again) and lose all motivation to go outside.

I grew up in the Santa Cruz mountains, just outside Los Gatos and think castle rock state park for example is amazing. One the best hikes is from castle rock through big basin down to the beach. Takes about 3 days to get there and so long as you have someone to pick you up at the beach it's pretty easy going.

[edit] from Los Gatos, Castle rock is 10 minute drive if your used to black rock road otherwise 20 minutes up highway 9

Henry Coe state park is 1 hour from SF on a good traffic day. It's 20+K acres with fantastic hiking. Mount Diablo is almost 4K feet, 1 hour from SF, and almost 4K feet. If you want bigger mountains, sure, other places are somewhat closer. Most people in the Bay Area aren't even aware of Henry Coe State Park.

You're right about Henry Coe, hands down the best backpacking in the Bay Area. Their backcountry is broken down into zones, inside those you can camp wherever you please.

Where does the peninsula end and the south bay begin? This has always been a bit blurry to me.

It's generally considered to be where San Mateo county ends and Santa Clara county begins, in other words, between Palo Alto and Mountain View.

Palo Alto is in Santa Clara County.

Any line is somewhat arbitrary, of course, but I would put it between Mountain View and Sunnyvale.

I think most people would encounter those terms while browsing http://sfbay.craigslist.org/search/pen/apa and http://sfbay.craigslist.org/search/sby/apa and the border seems to be the 85 freeway.

Not being snarky (and to each it's own) but what exactly do you like about the San Jose area? I personally never understood the appeal of San Jose to certain people, especially considering the insane housing prices. I used to live in Santa Clara for a year and that whole area was the most boring suburb I ever lived or been to. Everyone just zombies around in their cars between condo/house, dime in dozen office parks and whatever Safeway/Whole Foods. Maybe I missed something but living on the peninsula or even East bay has way more charm and things to do (at least to me?).

The appeal of the south bay is cheaper housing than the peninsula and the city, but also far less crime than the east bay (and less traffic, but not anymore). Also, most of the established tech companies are here: Google, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, Intel, AMD, Nvidia, Netflix, Cisco, etc. The tech scene is not just about startups. These established companies employ a lot of engineers, and they aren't going anywhere.

At some point in many engineers' careers, the startup scene becomes a bit less appealing. This isn't just because of work-life balance or ageism -- it's because most startups only need a few senior-level employees. The majority of startup employees are young because startups need people to do entry-level work, and young people are willing to. If you want to do truly interesting, challenging, senior-level programming work, you are far more likely to find it at a large company than at a startup.

That's not to say that there isn't plenty of boring work at large companies, because there is a ton of it, but rather that large companies have more open positions for senior-level engineers doing interesting work than startups do. Their benefits are also quite good, which matters more when you have a family. Most of these large companies are in the south bay, and if you are going to work at one of those companies, you might as well live nearby and save yourself the aggravation of a long commute, whether it be by car, train, or Google bus.

I know plenty of people who live in SF, and frankly some of them end up going out in San Francisco less often than I do. Most of their weeknights consist of going home, eating dinner, and watching TV or reading a book, just like most people. The big difference is that they pay over $3k for their apartments, and I pay half that. If you're going to have a conventional, boring home life 5 days a week, you might as well save some money. I can go to San Francisco whenever I feel like it.

Agree on your points about proximity to jobs. But there's plenty tech jobs in SF (and even east bay: Oracle, GE) and I noticed more companies rent coworking spaces in SF to accommodate employees who don't like the suburban lifestyle.

It's hard to agree on pricing though, San Jose has one of the most expensive prices per sq. foot in the country. According to certain charts even higher than SF. Which I never understood, the density is much lower and there seems to be more space but from what I understand it's because most properties are big(ger) houses on large lots that take up a lot of space.

Apartment rent and house prices are a lot lower in San Jose than in SF. The average is probably skewed by certain areas. I pay less than $2000 for a decent one-bedroom with reserved parking and onsite laundry, in a low-crime area, a few blocks from a train station. Try finding that in SF.

San Jose has one of the most expensive prices per sq. foot in the country. According to certain charts even higher than SF.

I have to think the ranking would be a lot different if it was calculated on (or to account for) lot size.

It's access to the mountains. If you're In to hiking an mountain biking it makes sense.

Silicon Valley is 3.5 hours from the Sierra (in good weather, without traffic, but there's always traffic). If that's the standard for "access to the mountains", the entire eastern seaboard also has "access to the mountains".

I like the bay area; I lived there for 10 years, and I travel there regularly. But the myth that it has some unique access to the outdoors is absurd. At my house in town in New England, I can walk out my back door and ski in the winter, and the Appalachian Trail is about 5 miles away.

It's 10 minutes away from Rancho San Antonio, 30 from the parks along Skyline, and an hour from Pacific Ocean beaches. You can get to a half-day hike with 1000 feet of vertical elevation change with under an hour of total driving time. And the weather is good enough for this 11 months out of the year.

I used to live in New England. There were definitely parts I liked - I really miss the seasons, and I grew up 15 minutes away from the birthplace of the American Revolution, and there are some charming walks in the woods. But there are very few places that give you the combination of beaches, marsh flats, mountains, redwoods, urban attractions, and the weather to enjoy it all that the Bay Area has within an hour drive.

> But there are very few places that give you the combination of beaches, marsh flats, mountains, redwoods, urban attractions, and the weather to enjoy it all that the Bay Area has within an hour drive.

Exactly the same conditions? No, of course not. Functionally equivalent (better in some ways, worse in others)? Absolutely there are lots of other options. I don't have the ocean, but I have better mountains than the bay area, and wonderful rivers. That's a win in my book, but reasonable people may disagree.

I don't see anyone on this thread saying that the bay area is bad. As I said, I love the bay area, and I'll probably live there again. It just isn't a magical land that's better than anywhere else on earth.

If mountain access is your primary goal, there are absolutely better options. Salt Lake City comes to mind, where you're literally minutes away from world-class terrain in the Wasatch, or Boulder/Denver. Both cities offer lots of job opportunities compared to the more traditional mountain towns. Boston and Seattle are also options, though they come with their own long drives. And there are other, smaller cities to consider in the US as well.

But SF is unique in that you have a major, cosmopolitan city that's relatively close to a wide variety of terrain and environments, from beaches to forest to mountains, etc. SF is a compromise like any other option, but if you love the outdoors, it's one that gives you a hell of a lot of flexibility while still enjoying the benefits of a large city. It's not Jackson Hole, where the mountains are right there, but no one expects it to be.

This is very well put, but I don't think San Francisco is exclusive to this, especially in California. I'm sitting in Orange County right now and every thing I could want to do is at most an hour and a half away. Twenty minutes to the ocean, and hour and a half to Lake Arrowhead/Big Bear, an hour from Los Angeles and an hour from San Diego. An hour away is also the desert (amazing for camping.) Hell for anyone who's still into CES Vegas is four hours away, three if you go a little faster than you should.

Although I get one of the biggest appeals to SF besides the flexibility is the large tech industry, but you'd be surprised how many meetups, companies and stuff you can get to because of the close proximity to two major metropolitan cities, and Irvine (believe it or not) is huge in tech but just business in general here.

Boulder/Denver is pretty amazing, and there are a lot of job opportunities. It has its own set of downsides though. The influx of people is crazy and housing prices are really, really high. Not Bay Area high, but Seattle high. Public transportation is OK for a US city (I don't have experience elsewhere) but traffic is - IMHO pretty bad.

I'm not saying "don't come here" (like many Coloradoans do). Just do your research.

Wait, what? Why do people from Austin and Denver always say their home prices are comparable to Seattle? The average home for sale is Seattle is $666k. It hasn't even broken $350k in Denver. I'm looking at homes on Redfin within 1 mile of the University and there are dozens of ~2k sq ft, 3br 2+ bath homes listed under $500k.

List prices don't tell the whole story. I've got several friends who have purchased homes in the past year or two and if you aren't ready to sign on the day you look at the house with $20k - $50K over asking you won't get the house.

That $350k number probably includes Denver and the surrounding area - the "under $500k" (like $450-499) number is more appropriate for closer to downtown.

Edit: According to Zillow you are correct http://www.zillow.com/denver-co/home-values/ http://www.zillow.com/seattle-wa/home-values/

The Denver Post says $400, but that's still not Seattle prices. http://www.denverpost.com/2016/06/03/denver-median-home-sold...

As a native, I'll say it then. Don't come here; or rather, don't move here. ;-)

No, don't move to Colorado. You'd hate it ;)

There are no mountains comparable to the Sierras within 3.5 hours drive of anywhere on the Eastern seaboard.

The Coast Ranges -- to which eastern seaboard mountain ranges might be loosely comparable -- are a lot closer to SV than 3.5 hours.

Now, if you are concerned about skiing, the limiting factor for SV is access to snow, not access to mountains.

I was going to mention a few places on the east coast that have the Sierras not only beat, but the whole region beat. But I'm going to shut up b/c I don't want people going there. Pulling my Bolinas card.

Sounds like you are ignoring the Santa Cruz Mountains which are full of excellent hiking and Mountain biking.

I've hiked nearly the entirety of the Santa Cruz mountains, and much of the northern Diablo range as well. They're pleasant, but fall short of what I would consider "excellent hiking". If that makes me a hiking snob, so be it =).

And what do you think of Mt Tam?

I confess a certain fondness for the steep ravine -> dipsea loop.

The Santa Cruz mountains are less than half an hour away.

Where do you live? I want to move there :)

Lebanon, NH, but almost anywhere within 5 miles of the AT in northern New England fits the description.

Get a remote job, move to the mountains.

EDIT:

https://github.com/lukasz-madon/awesome-remote-job

https://weworkremotely.com/

If I found a remote job, I'd probably move to Asheville. Such a cute little town with great food and views, but no tech jobs whatsoever.

I moved to Asheville after I had a remote job secured for a while. The problem is that Asheville, like much of the country, lacks jobs in general and that what's there pays rather little for even North Carolina even though the cost of living is the highest in the state. This offsets a lot of the cost advantages of being on a tech worker salary. A devops job I saw here paid $45k, and you can easily get $90k even in RTP.

Now I'm moving again a year later after I bought a house (rental options are terrible in small towns) mostly because my spouse has basically zero job prospects here despite some great credentials which meant an effective 30% pay cut on top of what I took to be a remote worker instead of onsite in a large metro area.

Don't move to Asheville specifically unless everyone in the house already has a job lined up or is really good at cooking or being a server.

Seconded. Asheville is one of the prettiest, most eclectic places in the entire country, with a reasonable cost of living to boot. Unfortunately all the jobs are in banking and the service sector.

> no tech jobs whatsoever

That really surprises me, given the Contra Dance scene in Asheville.

Amazing beer scene.

The nightlife scene in SF is mediocre at best. SF is by far the dirtiest city I've been to in the US; parts of it are downright disgusting. SV (excluding SF) is a terrible place to be a single man. It's fine for outdoor activities, but no better than you'll find in many other cities. The main advantage in terms of the outdoors is the weather. It's admittedly great, but it's similarly great along the entire 500 mile coastal stretch from San Diego to San Francisco (except SF is colder, cloudier, and windier than the rest of that stretch).

I moved here for the tech scene. Beyond tech, it just doesn't compare favorably to many of the other places I've lived. I realize this puts me in the minority -- my San Franciscan friends never stop talking about how amazing SF is. I think this mantra helps them justify their rent check each month.

> For me at least, the rent is kind of just the cost of having an enjoyable life in the US.

That's really sad. Since you grew up in a place with "with snow about 6 months of the year" and with "almost no hills and no ocean," SV must seem pretty great by comparison. But the US is a very big place, with a lot of really great cities and towns. I hope you get a chance to discover how much more is out there.

He must be from Minnesota or some other midwestern state.

tbh fatbiking is fun as shit in the snow.

The night life in SF/Oakland is fantastic depending on what you are into.

Mediocre might have been too harsh, but it's not significantly better than other cities I've lived in.

My biggest issue with the nightlife? The people. I'm tired of being surrounded by loud, drunk techies talking about apps, tech companies, coworkers, Ivy League schools, and venture capital. Maybe I'm going to the wrong places, and this doesn't describe everyone in tech, obviously, but it's in high enough concentration to consistently be noticeable and unpleasant.

I guess to each their own.

I never found the clubbing in SF to come close to any of the places in Asia (Tokyo, Shanghai, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Taipei). Similarly for bars Japan, at least for me, have SF beat by a long shot. You have your choice of quiet bars. Bars with 5 people. Bars for every type of drink. Themed bars. In SF all I found was extremely loud and crowded bars. Maybe it was just the bars my friend chose in SF the 7 years I lived there.

SF has tons of crime. Walk down any street in SOMA or the Mission and you'll see piles of glass from all the cars that were busted into in the few nights before.

Down in the south bay you lose any of the "city" benefits as it's all just suburbia. If you like suburbia (kids/family) that's great but it wasn't for me.

I lived in the area for roughly 2.5 years and absolutely agree with you.

There are many 'no-go' areas at night in SF, try to find those in Singapore, Tokyo, etc.

In addition, you know in Asia that the likelyhood someone is pulling a gun on you is mighty low. (Not to trigger a gun discussion)

During that time I have been to several music festivals. In the main area they had chairs....chairs! This is a rock-concert what do you need chairs for? Hardly anyone was dancing. Compare that to festivals in Europe. It is not even close.

Napa and Tahoe are beautiful areas. But come with a price tag.

I totally agree with you on Southeast Asia beeing hip, but (as an upcoming graduate), it is very hard to find a job there without fluency (or some cases, with total lack of knowledge of the language).

Yeah, the clubbing in SF has nothing on other places.

Do people move to SF for . . . "clubbing"?

The rave scene in SF was pretty good for a while. Then the club scene hit, followed by dotcom implosion, and the good times never really recovered. There were some dope dnb/jungle scenes that went down in small clubs/bars, but the large club scene in SF is not great.

I would say that the SF rave / underground music scene continues to be one of the strongest in the country

As someone who recently moved and previously spent 5 years within the Northern Europe underground techno scene, what's a good in to these circles in the bay?

This is what has trapped me now. I'm not too keen on living here anymore, but don't want to miss out on ski + climbing + hiking.

Vancouver, Canada. I am about an hour from skiing, sailing, canoing, hiking, mountain biking, rock climbing, et al; throughout most of the year.

The trick is to work for a Valley firm, making Valley wages, and telecommuting; SAP is the only local shop that pays a decent wage.

We Vancouverites are spoiled. I just finished an 18 month stint in the Bay Area. One of the biggest inconveniences was the driving time (especially with traffic) to get to the mountains.

In Seattle now and it's a great compromise. Similar wages to the Bay Area but similar geography and outdoor access as Vancouver. And even with the exchange rate housing is cheaper than Vancouver.

I spent a summer in Seattle and did more hiking, kayaking, and biking than I did in the year prior. It's an amazing place to work if you like the outdoors.

I heard Vancouver is almost as expensive as SF - at least housing. Is that the case?

In SF, house prices and rent are pretty close. In Vancouver they are disconnected. Equivalent rent can be about half or lower of what the mortgage would cost. Even though the average house is about $4 million now.

The bigger problem is the relatively low wage.

And on top of that everything is more expensive in Canada.

Seattle is definitely the economic sweet spot, and I would live there if it wasn't for the weather and the companies I can work for.

Anecdotally: 640 sqr feet around Stadium station is about 2300 CDN/mo.

Is it tough to move to Canada as a US resident w/ a US job?

These are the options: http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/immigrate/eligibility.asp

Consider Colorado. A strong tech scene and world class in those activities.

If skiing/climbing/hiking are what you want specifically, you can do a lot better than the bay area in the US. The bay area is good for these things, but there are plenty of places in north america that are closer to better opportunities for them (especially skiing!)

Yeah once you live in the Rockies you realize how overcrowded the California resorts are, and how bad the snow is relative to what you get at 10-14k feet.

Do you feel sick at 14k? I will go to Colorado to ski for the first time this year. Wanted to go last year but then we had a great season at Tahoe.

No, but I was living at 7k in Santa Fe at the time. Also that will be just the top of the lifts, pretty sure all the bases are below 12 or 13k.

There's nothing lift-serviced in the US above 13k feet. Colorado has a number of 14ers, but no lifts run that high; the highest is Breck, where the highest lift runs to just below 13k. That's high enough to make everything more tiring, but low enough that there's no serious effects for most people. Even in CO, most ski lifts top out between 11k and 12k.

> I love that the people here are generally very chill and loving.

Until you put them behind the wheel of a car! I find Californians to be super friendly and welcoming in general... but I've also seen a fair share of Prius road ragers freaking out at pedestrians and cyclists!

There are bad drivers everywhere. I don't know what it is about driving that makes people think their state's drivers are the worst.

> I don't know what it is about driving that makes people think their state's drivers are the worst.

Comparisons to other states they have lived in? Oregonians are way more mellow on the roads than Californians, bar none.

This is all based on highly subjective impressions of course, but in my experience the problem with SV drivers is the opposite of what you're insinuating. If there's a stereotypical SV driver, it's someone who is mellow to the point of endangering everyone else on the road- merging onto 65 MPH freeways at 30 MPH, putzing along in the fast lane going well below the speed limit, not using turn signals, rolling up to stoplights and stopping multiple car lengths behind the car in front of them, screwing around with their phones while driving, and just generally being very lackadaisical, careless, impolite, and unaware of what's going on around them. The drivers tend to be nonaggressive, unaware, and pokey to the point of being a source of actual danger to others.

I think back in the early 90's I read something which said "your house doesn't matter, because you won't be spending much time in it with all of the outdoor things you can do and the nice weather".

Now it's "your house doesn't matter, because you'll be spending nights and weekends in the office. But it's OK, we have free meals and beanbag chairs."

As Californians say - there is a sunshine tax baby (refering to higher cost of living there )

There's also a sunshine tax referring to the actual high taxes in California.

This is not correct. The weather in San Diego is a lot better than the Bay area but the cost of housing is a lot less. The tax is access to high-paying tech jobs.

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