January 21st – January
27th 2013
We are staying in California for
additional 8 weeks (J. just need to sign the contract). The weather
is still nice, relatively warm and sunny. On Sunday, we drove to
Sunnyvale (about 20 miles) to check the place, where we might move
for those two extended months. It was pretty nice place, pretty much
same distance to Caltrain and downtown Sunnyvale. J. spent three days
in Michigan and came back Wednesday night. There was some mechanical
problem on the plane in Atlanta, so she was 1.5 hours late. That was
quite unfortunate, because she had to work next day. She was very
tired, so I drove her to work. I would say, that that night messed up
following few days (I was quite tired too). Otherwise (not counting
weather I guess) she enjoyed her visit at home very much. Oh … snow
…
On Monday, Martin Luther King Day, I
drove to the coast. It was nice and sunny day, so I left pretty
early. I parked on one small beach (dirt parking lot on the cliffs).
The access to the beach was kind of hard, but possible. So I took
nice walk on the beach. There were some people, but it was not too
bad. Nice views, bit of wind and ocean without the end.
I drove probably 6 miles north on the
road number 1 and at the end of residential street found newly formed
park. I read, that several organizations in Bay Area are keeping up
(and when possible) expanding open public space. It was smaller one
mile loop in the hills above the town. There were some steep parts,
but the views from the peaks were spectacular. I could see the town,
small airport and whole bay (Half Moon Bay).
And again, it really looks like spring
is here.
Just couple miles down the road, next
to the airport, was Pillar Bluff County Park. It was small walk up
and about a mile loop on the bluff. The views of ocean were
incredible, wind was just light and pleasant. There were some people,
again, but it was not too bad. There was no access to the beach (it
looked like there was a beach with low tide). Still, the views were
well worth it. Apparently, it was not on the map, there was path all
the way down to the cove parking lot. I walked that way before
realizing it and had to turn around, looking for shortcut, I ended up
in the woods and I believe there were some shelters of homeless
people. Strange.
There was really nice view of the
airport and actually quite a few people were flying there. It was
interesting to watch small planes taking off.
And that was pretty much all. I was
hungry, so I was heading home. The town was really busy, there was
probably 200 cars parked along the road and many people surfing in
the bay. Luckily most of them were driving north, so I was just
watching the line of cars half a mile long. Nice weather, holiday
Monday (MLK) and ocean. I guess, next time we will go there on
weekday.
On Tuesday, I took a train to San Jose.
It took about 40 minutes. I did not have any plans, so I just started
to walk towards the downtown. There was light rail track next to the
train station (used by Amtrak and few other transportation lines). It
was nice day (again). There was almost nobody on the streets, it was
really weird. (It was about 10 am on workday.) I had small map of the
city (San Jose is the biggest city in Bay area) so I was following it
to the center. The city was somewhat strange, the streets were wide,
many big buildings (some of them were nice), there were as well light
rail tracks, but it did not work together. It was just strange and
empty. There were few people, but mostly the streets were pretty
empty. And … there was a lot of homeless people. Unimpressed by the
downtown, I had sort of back up plan, to go to Japanese friendship
garden. It was across freeway 280 and I did not have a map of that
area.
On the way to the garden, I was just
wandering around and hoping for some nicer and more interesting parts
of city. It did not really happen. I took small break in the park
with the water feature. Later I found out that it was the main park
in the downtown area. Ok.
Without map, I was just following
general direction, that I had in my head. It got more residential,
few parts had small stores etc, but it looked kind of poor and trashy
(for big part). It got really warm. I started to be worried that I
was lost, but finally I found sport's facilities and next to them the
park with the garden. It was nice, but kind of boring. At least they
had fish there.
I found a lot of signs “for lease”.
I as well saw a lot of homeless people.
Even on the way from the garden, there was few tents next to the
road.
Later I read that San Jose is called
“capital of Silicon Valley” and is pretty rich (measured by
income and production). I had hard time to believe it after what I
saw, but I guess everything is possible. I did not really find
anything super interesting, so I just walk slowly back to the train
station and went home.
