Ask HN: I have one day, what should I see in the Silicon Valley? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: I have one day, what should I see in the Silicon Valley?

24 pointsaxk33 comments

I will be in Palo Alto next week for a job interview and will have an entire day for myself. Where should I go and what should I do? I've been all over Europe, Australia and S-E Asia, but it's my first visit to the US. Thanks!

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SF and Silicon Valley are relatively standard cities/areas (but the overall, Bay Area environment is fantastic). I don't think you'll find anything particularly special about San Francisco: it's a nice, cultured city, but you've already seen plenty of those.

As diego mentioned, Silicon Valley is about doing, so see the do-ers and the do-ers hangouts:

    * Visit google's campus in Mountain View (cab ride from Caltrain);
    * Visit DogPatch Labs in SF (15 minute walk from Caltrain);
    * Visit RocketSpace in SF  (15 minute walk from Caltrain);
    * Visit Hacker Dojo in Mountain View (10 minute walk from Caltrain);
    * Walk around Stanford's campus (5 min walk from Caltrain);
    * Grab coffee at Coupa Cafe or lunch at University Cafe
      in Palo Alto (5 minute walk from Caltrain);
    * Don't visit Facebook (it's a boring campus).

If you're an avid reader of Hacker News, seeing some of these places might provide some helpful context for the stories you read.

Obviously, if you're going to visit these places or others, drop another story on HN with places + times and I'm sure folks will try to greet you.

Thanks for the list! The Hacker Dojo looks like a nice place to visit (and work in!), I wish I had more time to fully appreciate it. By the way, is it open on Sundays?

According to the Dojo's site:

    Hacker Dojo allows guests from 8AM to 10PM 
    depending on member presence, and is open 
    24/7 to members.

I'm sure there'll be people there on the weekends.

Also, is the day you have free a Sunday? That might change things a bit...

Yes, it's next Sunday.

I thought Facebook was pretty cool actually (the inside, not the outside). Although, I haven't been to their new campus, so I can't comment on that.

Short answer: Silicon Valley is about doing, not about seeing. Given that it's your first time in the US, enjoy San Francisco instead.

I suggest focusing on getting and accepting personal invitations you get on here. Meeting people is far more interesting than going to specific locations, in my experience. The more places like Hacker Dojo you can visit, the better (there are some great hacker places you can stay at on AirBnB, too). You might even land more interviews out of it ;-)

If you're an Apple fan, don't forget to swing by the Apple campus store at 1 Infinite Loop. They had plenty of trinkets in there I hadn't seen at other stores.

Palo Alto is a pretty nice town in its own right although it's not culture central like SF. Must admit I'm not a big SF fan though and prefer heading to where interesting things are occurring rather than wandering about as a tourist.

If you have a car, Buck's of Woodside is worth a visit if you appreciate its history and significance in geek culture, but if you don't, there's little to actively see.

You might find this discussion useful (both the linked article, and the many replies): http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1757521

Depends on what you want to see. Silicon Valley itself isn't actually all that exciting as a tourist imo; lots of interesting stuff goes on there, but mostly inside nondescript office parks. But the Computer History Museum is cool. San Francisco is a fairly interesting city, but much of its interestingness isn't specifically "silicon valley", though it does have considerable tech. There's also lots of nature-stuff nearby if you're into that.

I second the computer history museum. It's really great, and free. I went with my family at my mom's behest and told them all "listen, I'm a computer dork so I'll like this, but don't blame me if you all hate it, I'm not forcing you to do this", and everyone loved it. Even the history major!

I was there a few weeks ago. It's not free, but $15 is probably trivial for anyone visiting the Bay Area.

Try to setup another interview... In the city.

A commute from sf to palo alto isn't horrendous if you live in the southern parts of the city. But try to find an opportunity in the city. Unless apartment complex living in th valley appeals to you...

I was in the same predicament a few months ago after coming up from Australia (though not for job interview ;-)).

My wife and I rented a car from San Jose and drove around. If you are used to public transport in Europe or even Australia - you'll find navigating your way around solely on public transport difficult.

But, California has a great highway system, so if you feel brave enough and have some cash - a rental car allows you to see more in the short amount of time you'll have.

That said, when I visited the Google campus in Mountain View, there wasn't a whole lot to see; plus I found myself feeling a little unwelcome with everyone doing a double check on whether we had badges on (which is a good thing... for campus security!). But that may have just been the SLR camera I was walking around with ;-) On the serious side - their campus is nice - and they have multi-coloured bicycles for getting around... cool!

I'd definitely try to checkout Stanford - the campus is gorgeous (as is Berkeley - if you can get there); Luckily, I happened to be there the day Steve Job's ceremony was being conducted - so we got to see the campus, the secret service, California police, and a whole bunch of celebs.

For the Icons of IT tour, if you have the time (and a car) you could check out all the other Silicon Valley icons within short driving distance:

    * Apple in Cupertino
    * Yahoo! in Sunnyvale
    * Cisco in San Jose
    * eBay's Whitman campus (they have a nice play house with an office built inside) 
    * Intel museum in Santa Clara

The Facebook office isn't very exciting - we arrived at their Palo Alto campus but there's nothing to see - you can wander into the foyer and take a peek through the glass doors where all the staff work, but that's about it.

Also, the computer history museum is excellent - it'll take you a few hours to really get through the various sections so if you have the time - I'd check that out. That's right near Google, so you could walk (20mins?) from Google's office.

I'd go see the Computer History Museum. It's pretty amazing

Agreed. Specially if they still have the Babbage Difference Engine No. 2 on display (it was absolutely thrilling seeing it actually working).

I second it.

Thirded.

If you don't want to head up to San Francisco, check out Stanford, hop on the train to Mountain View and check out Google's Campus.

Agreed here. Also, if you have time, swing by the Hacker Dojo in Mountain View. Here's a quick video tour: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYt-E0BVSCc

Take the Caltrain (huge ass train compared to Europe) to SF. Enjoy the city, it has a really nice architecture I think. Great mix between older, newer and a lot of colors :-)

Go hang out at Noisebridge in the mission in SF. Tons of interesting people hang out there and there are plenty of start-ups that frequent the place.

Sounds like the answers are split into two camps:

* be a fanboy and visit corporate campuses

* be a tourist and go run around somewhere

Not being a fanboy myself, I'd vote to spend the day in Santa Cruz. Stay for the sunset. Much more interesting than Google.

Good luck with your interview!

If you like outdoors and the beach, maybe drive over the mountains from Palo Alto to the beach and drive up to San Francisco, its an awesome drive in my opinion, then you can go check out SF. Actual Silicon Valley is a bit boring, in my opinion, I prefer SF to actually go and have fun for a day.

I was in SV for the first time recently. The google campus was cool, computer history musuem was also cool and almost beside google. It was good to see the Stanford campus too. SF was just like any other city for me, so I didn't do much sightseeing there.

Go to the Exploratorium. It's a one-of-a-kind, hands-on science museum in San Francisco.

Forget technology, go see some art.

And like @jack said, buy some local artisan goods.

Go to Buck's in Woodside for breakfast (http://www.buckswoodside.com/) and try to identify who's a VC and who's a CEO. Great rich people watching. Plus the food is good.

Stop by techshop (a shared maker-space) for a free tour. There's a location in Menlo Park, and one in SF about a 15 minute walk from Caltrain. (http://techshop.ws)

A shameless plug for our free 1 Day self-guided tour of SF: http://www.unanchor.com/launch

That's exactly what you need :)

You might find Steve Blank's guide to Silicon valley useful: http://steveblank.com/visitors-guide/

Half day to explore Palo Alto then up to San Francisco before your flight out of SFO.

For an entire day: wander around San Francisco. For an afternoon: hike Windy Hill.

It's not "city" stuff, but Muir Woods is in the area and is wonderful.

http://www.nps.gov/muwo/index.htm

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