Ultimate guide to tours of San Jose

SJtoday has a great guide to every possible San Jose tour you can imagine. There are free walking tours, Segway tours down Guadalupe River, the San Jose Brew Bike, Ghost Tours (something I didn't even know about), Mt. Hamilton tours, and even boat tours--yes, San Jose has boats and access to the Bay in Alviso.

Next time you hear a friend say there is nothing to do in San Jose, find out what they like and take them on a tour. We have something for just about everyone.

See the full list here.

SanJose2030 Man on the Street Ep1

Our friend and fellow San Jose-enthusiast David Manzo from Bejaw Productions has started a new YouTube series to document the many changes Downtown San Jose will experience through 2030. 

In his inaugural video, he takes us through the Alameda, Downtown West, and ends with a very cool time lapse deconstruction of the old Poor House Bistro as well as a tour of its new home at Little Italy San Jose. While it's sad to see the original Poor House shut down to make way for Google, the new location is going to be amazing and will help Little Italy thrive!

Check out the video below or over here.

Guided Downtown San Jose Street Art Tour

Art helps brighten the day, and we could use a little extra brightening right now. Downtown San Jose boasts one of the most impressive collections of murals in the Bay Area. Ecocity Cycles is now offering a full blown COVID-compliant tour by pedicab. The tour takes about an hour and includes visiting over 20 murals and a free treat from a local bakery. They are also using an XL pedicab that can seat up to 6 and you can even choose whether to have a top cover or go full-on convertible.

For more info or to book a tour, head over here.

Silicon Valley Roots & Shoots

I just learned about a great app called Silicon Valley Roots & Shoots. It's an insider's guide to Silicon Valley and lets you create your own Silicon Valley tour focused around the people and places that made this region the tech epicenter it is today. The app was created by David A. Laws, a 40-year veteran o Silicon Valley that has worked his way up from being a junior engineer to an executive at semiconductor companies such as Fairchild, AMD, and Altera. Currently he is a consultant and semiconductor curator at the Computer History Museum.

Some of the key attractions featured in the app are the birthplaces of:

• Computer Chips
• Video Games
• Disk Drives
• Video Recorders
• Ethernet
• Apple
• Facebook
• Google
• HP

It also has a comprehensive list of local landmarks, museums, companies, educational institutions and restaurants that comprise the historical fabric of Silicon Valley. I even found a few places that I had no idea existed. Everything is very well organized and the app makes it easy to hit up multiple places in a single area or city.

The Silicon Valley Roots & Shoots app is available for both Android and iOS, and only costs $2-3. You can find more information about it over here.

New Downtown San Jose Walking Tours!

One more step has been taken towards making Downtown a legitimate tourist destination. A group of students have come together under the guidance of Greg Adler--a high school teacher at Santa Teresa--to provide walking tours of Downtown San Jose. The group is called San Jose Walks & Talks and we should do everything we can to support them.

Their signature tour is aptly named Adobe to Adobe. It starts at the Peralta Adobe in the San Pedro Square Market and then goes all the way to the Adobe headquarters and back. The tour takes about an hour and the suggested donation is only $5. The next walk is Saturday, February 16th at 11:30am.

Downtown San Jose is filled with such a rich history that I think you will be surprised at how much you'll learn on these tours.

For more information, check out their website over here or email contact@sanjosewalksandtalks.org.

San Jose Silicon Valley Tours

During my vacation to Europe over the summer, my wife and I would always start out each new city with a double-decker bus tour. This was a great way to familiarize ourselves with the city, learn a little history, and plan out which touristy attractions we wanted to do during our stay. I couldn't help but think to myself that San Jose should have some sort of bus tour highlighting our museums and attractions. Fortunately, I wasn't the only one who had this idea.

San Jose Silicon Valley Tours is a new company that will provide 3 different kinds of tours right here in our backyard:

• The San Jose Tour
• Narrated three and a half hour trip
• Stops at Japantown, Peralta Adobe, Fallon Hours, Rosicrucian Museum, Rose Garden, Kelley Park
• As part of the tour, they'll stop for photo opps and visit at least two museums.
• $79 per person
• The Silicon Valley Tour
• Narrated five and a half hour tour
• Stops at the headquarters of Google, Facebook, eBay; Stanford, the Palo Alto Garage, Apple company store
• Tour of the Intel Museum and the Computer History Museum
• $99 per person
• Custom Tours

Needless to say, this is a HUGE step towards promoting tourism in San Jose and Silicon Valley. To help support them, here is a link to their tours.