Tour of California
Part One - Los Angeles
Part Two - Glendale, Pasadena, Hollywood, Beverly Hills
Part Three - Riverside, Santa Ana, Long Beach
Since my trip to San Diego this past weekend was postponed since I was sick, I thought I'd go ahead and skip to California's third largest city, San Jose. These were taken between Christmas and New Years 2006, thus the holiday decorations and lack of people (most offices were closed that week).
Even though I have lived in the Bay Area for over six years, I had never before been to San Jose before taking these pictures, at least not to downtown. Now I don't wish to get into any debates over whether San Jose is better than San Francisco, or vice versa. There is a reason why San Francisco is simply called "The City" and no matter how many jobs and no matter how many baseball or football teams head south that will not change. However, San Jose seems to be a very nice, liveable "working" city in it of itself. The downtown actually has quite a lot of amenities, is walkable, has relatively frequent light rail service, and it seems you could live downtown and still not feel like you were living in a city of a million people.
An bit of an urban retreat
In every city I visit, I become a little obsessed with one building or another, this is the one I found in San Jose.
The planes approaching the airport make for some cool photos, but, are also reportedly responsible for SJ's lack of tall buildings
The Sobrato Office Tower...bear with me...
Entrance to San Jose State University
Views from SJSU parking garage
Near downtown residential
A church by SJSU campus
Back to downtown
Santa Clara County Courthouse
According to Emporis, this is San Jose's tallest
A few more before I go...
And lastly...
Added more photos taken this past Christmas