2016 May. Palo Alto. Mountain View. Cupertino. San Jose. Santa Cruz
Upon arrival at SFO after a long flight, we picked up our rental car and headed south to Palo Alto. Stanford campus looked so beautiful under the Californian sun. A lazy afternoon stroll rekindled the familiar warm and nice campus feeling in me that had faded away over the years, made me miss my alma mater Rice so much suddenly.
University Avenue nearby is a commercial street lined with restaurants and shops. We had lunch at Farmers’ Union and coffee at Blue Bottle, both had nice casual dining ambience.
A short drive away from Palo Alto are Mountain View and Cupertino where Google and Apple Campus are located respectively. Apple Shop has nice minimal designed special edition T-shirts sold only in this Cupertino HQ store. Fans of Apple would love the chic and sleek clean designs. Google Merchandise Store at their Mountain View HQ, on the other hand, sells mainly ugly stuff. Tell me whether you agree if you get a chance to visit. =) I spent a good hour there trying to find a souvenir but really could not find anything nice that is worth buying. Kids would probably love the android lawn statues there however.
After resting for the night at Aloft Hotel in Cupertino, we had a good brunch at Deluxe Eatery Drinkery in San Jose the next day. Across the street was a Safeway to buy some groceries. We swang by Walmart and Sports Basement to get the necessary equipment and stuffs for camping. Shopped around and decided on a mobile router and data plan from T-Mobile, in order to stay connected while on the road. Although SFO airport has a small kiosk at the arrival hall, options there were limited and service was neither helpful nor friendly.
After getting ready everything needed for the road trip, we set off for Santa Cruz in the late afternoon! This is the famed Santa Cruz Boardwalk. Parking at the garage is horrendously expensive charged by per entry. If you can, find a roadside metered parking, it will save you a lot of money.
Witnessed Baywatch live in action! Mr Tattoo here tried to be the hero and swam too far out into the sea beyond the safety boundary, and had to rescued back to shore by the hunky lifeguard. Oh well, if only Pamela Anderson was also here to bounce into action… 🙂
… to be continued …
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