# San Francisco vs. San Jose - Base of Operations?



## sbindra (Oct 18, 2004)

Traveling from the northeast (where we are enjoying our temps in the 20s today with a brisk wind) to the Bay Area at the beginning of March. My wife and I are flying into San Francisco and she has a conference in San Jose. We will either stay in downtown San Francisco and she will take Caltran each morning or stay in San Jose.

From a riding perspective, which is a better base? I am using this as a mini-camp for the upcoming season. I'd like to get in some good riding of 4 plus hours a day and avoid doing a lot of junk miles. I've read that just north of the Golden Gate is beautiful but it looks pretty busy.

And does anyone have suggestions for either location on routes?


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## ericm979 (Jun 26, 2005)

There's plenty to ride around San Jose and it's easier to get out of the city to decent riding.
Caltrain from SF to SJ makes for a very long commute.

From SJ you can go east and do Mt Hamilton, Sierra rd and Calaveras. 
If you go west there's a whole pile of stuff in the costal range.
A good source for routes: http://actc.org/


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## EBrider (Aug 9, 2009)

Better riding in San Jose (unless you are a bicycle messenger) and it will save your wife an hour in each direction.


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## Undecided (Apr 2, 2007)

Stay in the middle. Great riding from the peninsula, easier if you want to get up to SF.


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## Ventruck (Mar 9, 2009)

ericm979 said:


> Caltrain from SF to SJ makes for a very long commute.


Good Lord, school semester is right around the corner.

And riding in either city is no fun. I'd go around Woodside and whatnot. Check out the climb record thread here.


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## grrrah (Jul 22, 2005)

Agree with the others about San Jose, but there is very good riding from SF also, and its not that hard to ride out of SF if you know the best routes. Once you cross the bridge, there are tons of options.

That said, I'd stay in SJ also if your main focus is to ride and save your wife some commute time. Personally I'd stay in SF for the tourism experience.


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## orangeclymer (Aug 18, 2009)

SJ for sure. Much more to choose from on a daily basis.


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## slow.climber (Nov 25, 2010)

San Francisco is way more interesting than San Jose. Silicon Valley is a great place to start a business but San Francisco is where the fun is.

If you wife doesn't mind doing a commute, you'll have tons more options for things to do after the conference if you stay in San Francisco.

OTOH, the commute from San Francisco to San Jose is a long one, even if you catch the express train. If you miss the express, it's truely painful.

Maybe Mountain View would work. The commute from MV isn't too horrific and that would give you the option of rinding west out over the ridge. You could do Kings Mountain, Old La Honda, and Tunitas Creek Road.

Kind of a drag to come to the Bay Area and miss riding the Golden Gate Bridge, Marin Headlands, Mount Tam, etc.

Caltrain is bike friendly. You could take your bike to San Francisco and ride north.

You can do a nice 100 mile ride from Mountain View/Palo Alto. No single climb would be more than 800 foot, but it would could score a few thousand feet total riding from Mountain View, north to San Francisco, out over the bridge, once around the headlands, and then back.

You could do a double metric centry with about a verticle mile if you did an out-and-back from Mountain View to Mt. Tam.

Some good ride options here, http://www.bikely.com/listpaths/by/BuenosAires


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## Killroy (Feb 9, 2006)

Caltrain from SF to SJ can be a long ride. Get closer to SJ


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## BigDaddy (May 10, 2004)

No brainer here! San Jose all the way....south bay is usually much warmer, usually less rain, AND less congested making it less likely to get run over.


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