Bay Area Notes

I spent a few days in Bay Area. Here are a few general observations. I stayed close to the San Jose Airport, a stones throw from the VTA Light Rail station that's called Metro/Airport. There's a Chevron gas station with a small food mall right there. This is on the VTA blue and green lines, and without a car it makes commuting a whole lot easier. From here I could go to Santa Clara and beyond in the south and all the way to Mountain View in the north. Credit cards work of you're buying a ticket from the vending machines at the stops, and you can also use the Token Transit app to buy a day pass. I have never seen anyone ask for tickets but why not play by the rules! Light rail does get a diverse crowd including homeless people and addicts. Normally this isn't a problem and I have been on these trains as late as 11.00 pm in the night. But you want to watch your back. Also walking around alone in downtown San Jose post sundown isn't recommended - it's safer than most places still, but there are incidents of mugging that happen from time to time. 

If you're heading to Milpitas, like the Great Mall or to Mountain View or Palo Alto, you need to take the orange line light rail. So you would typically get down at Bypointe (blue line) or Champion (green line) and take the train towards Alum Rock for Milpitas, or towards Mountain View.

If you're heading to Mountain View and beyond, like Palo Alto or Redwood City, then you either take the Caltrain from Mountain View, or go to San Jose Diridon and take the Caltrain from there. Caltrain is a lot faster and well-maintained. You can actually take the Caltrain all the way up to Millbrae which is a San Francisco suburb. From there you can take a third kind of railway - the BART. Alternatively you can go to Milpitas and move from the light rail to the BART station and take the train to Embarcadero in SF from there. Caltrain's ticketing system is similar to VTA light rail's but Token Transit app doesn't work. On the other hand BART is different - too swipe your credit card to enter the station and swipe it to exit and it gets charged automatically. 

VTA buses are also an effective means to travel where trains don't and the drivers are super helpful. There are Clipper cards you can buy if you're going to be a regular, and want to avail all the discounts etc. I didn't need it on the short trip. 

For the duration of my trip, I used Uber only twice for short distance travel. I did walk a couple of miles a few times and that comes in handy. Having a rental car is a very good option if you're confident about driving in the US. I am not and without likely miss exits and not drive fast enough. 

Mountain View and Palo Alto are small towns with a bustling crowd in the downtown. Stanford is in Palo Alto and you can take a free bus ride to it. Bell's Books in Palo Alto is a great place to shop for books - open only till 5 pm on most days. I also discovered Streetlight Records, a record store and  an institution in its own right. Incredibly broad collection of music CDs, vinyls etc at good prices. This is in Bascom, South San Jose. Take the green line light rail to Fruitdale or Bascom and walk if you're crazy like me. Prefer Fruitdale if you're going to walk. 

Food is somewhat expensive and underwhelming. Dish Dash / Dish n Dash works great for Middle Eastern food that most desis like. Naan, Curries etc in Great Mall is nice for North Indian food. Banana Leaf in Milpitas is fantastic South East Asian. Maggiano in Santana Row, Stevens Creek Blvd is decent for Italian as is Il Fornaio inside Westin, near San Jose Convention Center. I would prefer Maggiano. The Recycle Bookstore, somewhere not too far from downtown San Jose is another gem but you need plenty of time in hand. The Oklava Cafe in Palo Alto, the Cafe Baklava in Mountain View were the two places I went to, and they see both good. Great desserts actually. Oren's Hummua too but their sabbich sandwich was disappointing.