> > I'm going to go to Silicon Valley for Spring Break, and I don't know where to go. Since you all seem to have vast banks of knowledge, can you tell me what a good thing to do there would be? Touring, perhaps.
> >
> > ShadowClerk
>
> If I remember correctly, Silicon Valley is just a bunch of electronics factories somewhere south of L.A. It's probably in Orange County. I don't know why anybody would go there, but within a short drive you can find Disneyland and Long Beach. Long beach, home of the Queen Mary, is the jumping off place for Santa Catalina. Just 26 miles on a boat and you are in a very interesting little town called Avalon. Or a magic little place called Two Harbors. Don't miss Santa Catalina. Carlsbad Beach State Park is nice if you go toward San Diego. And Huntington Beach is a good place to go sightseeing. And there's always Burbank, but it's a white-knuckles freeway ride to the north side of the big city. Mountains and deserts are to the east. Do you know what's on top of Mt. Polomar?
> Howard

Actually, Silicon Valley originally started out as roughly the area between San Jose and Palo Alto, but now I think people consider it to strech a little further north to Redwood City (home of Yahoo, Excite, and yours truly).

Silicon Valley is a great place to go if you want to find a job, but not the most exciting place when you're on vacation. In the Silicon Valley itself, the only two fun things I can think of at the moment are Great America (theme park) in Santa Clara and the San Jose Tech Museum. I'm sure there's lots of other stuff, but it depends on what you like to do.

If you're willing to drive a little bit, I would suggest visiting San Francisco. You could visit Fisherman's Wharf, Alcatraz, or Chinatown. There's also the Exploratorium, which, although kind of made for kids, is fun no matter what age you are.

Or you could drive to Santa Cruz and visit the beach. There's the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, which is also a theme park, but on a much smaller scale than Great America. It's the amusement park they used to film some scenes from the movie "Lost Boys". It may or may not be open while you're here, though. There are lots of beautiful beaches when you drive over the Santa Cruz Mountains. There are also lots of beautiful hiking and biking trails.

A little further south of Santa Cruz is Monterrey, which has the Monterrey Bay Aquarium. It's pretty awesome if you're into the ocean and sea-life. It's really large with lots of aquariums (if you still call them that when they're so big) of different kinds of marine life, along with tide pools and other stuff (I haven't been there in a long time). And, further south is Carmel, which is a beautiful (and pricey) little beach town. It's got lots of cute shops, Pebble Beach golf course, and 17 mie drive; definately the most beautiful 17 miles I've ever seen.

Hope that helps. If you want additional info or have questions, let me know