| Yeah, I think if you're going to scout the city and want to get a feel for what it would be like to live in SF (rather than vicinity, which is completely different) you should want to spend at least two weeks in SF. I would say stay at an AirBnB for lodging. I think that will give you a better window into what daily life might look like for you. A hotel is going to be disengaged. "Silicon Valley" kind of has as its epicenter in Palo-Alto. However, that really is a rough geographic description. Most mature companies are HQd in SF or San Jose (those are the normal boundaries). SF has companies and startups, tho most could be considered companies which use web-technologies to provide services (AirBnB, Yelp, Craigslist) whereas peninsula companies might fit more the web-infrastructure and platformy (Google, VMware, Verisign, FB) side of things. Mountain View-Santa Clara-San Jose is more Hardware (Intel, Cisco, IBM). That's overly simplified. It's just to give you some rough bearing. UC Berkeley is 30 mins away via Rapid Trainsit (Bart), Stanford U is about 1hr from SF on Commuter Rail (CalTrain) SF is a bit expensive to live in, as a student with little income. Your situation might be different. Many people share rent or the sort, to make things more affordable, if they do want to remain in SF. However, that introduces the vagaries that come with having roommates. You can look for upcoming events you might want to check out here http://sf.funcheap.com/events/san-francisco/ Lodgning at: airbnb.com look at rent info: http://hotpads.com/ also http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/hhh/ Proto- Startup Culture, maybe a quick stop at Hacker Dojo?
http://wiki.hackerdojo.com/w/page/25437/FrontPage (It's in the middle of a middle-aged non-descript office park, but it's reachable via Caltrain Mountain View Station ~10 min walk) |