Who thinks San Francisco has the best weather in the USA? (San Diego: air quality, cars)
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You would rate this area as better than any area in southern California???
Would definitely rate that area better than many places in SoCal, ie. (SFV, SGV, Inland Empire). That southern San Mateo County to Santa Clara County has the best weather in the state outside of the Coastal SoCal (Santa Monica, La Jolla). This is assuming that you like moderate temperature year round. For me personally, I like my summers a bit warmer, but not unrelentlessly hot, so San Jose/Salinas/Anaheim/Downtown LA are more to my liking.
Would definitely rate that area better than many places in SoCal, ie. (SFV, SGV, Inland Empire). That southern San Mateo County to Santa Clara County has the best weather in the state outside of the Coastal SoCal (Santa Monica, La Jolla). This is assuming that you like moderate temperature year round. For me personally, I like my summers a bit warmer, but not unrelentlessly hot, so San Jose/Salinas/Anaheim/Downtown LA are more to my liking.
Sure the inland areas are vastly inferior to the coastal areas. But I've got to think the stretch of Orange county coastline that gets partial protection/blockage of the marine layer by Catalina Island ( Long Beach south through Laguna Beach) is the best area for weather in the state.
Sure the inland areas are vastly inferior to the coastal areas. But I've got to think the stretch of Orange county coastline that gets partial protection/blockage of the marine layer by Catalina Island ( Long Beach south through Laguna Beach) is the best area for weather in the state.
Skyway, if you end up in the East Bay, I don't think you'll have too much trouble adapting to the weather. It's all relative. Compared to 99% of the country, the weather is great. It's only the SoCal'ers who can't handle anything. Seriously, try living anywhere east of the Rockies that's not South Florida. Even the deep south gets way colder than the Bay Area ever does. I live in Emeryville near Oakland, and we get tons of sunshine much of the year. Yes, winter can be gloomy, but in CA, it's always feast or famine with the rain. Last year, it was 75 F in January. This year, rain. I would not say that it's anything even remotely close to, say, the PNW. You'll have three months of fairly cloudy and damp weather, but with definite breaks, and some years, even a week or two of sun at a time even in winter. But most of the year, it's pretty good.
My only complaint about SF/Oakland weather is that it's not usually that warm until you get into downtown Oakland and south, away from the effect of the fog rushing in through the Golden Gate. Where I live, it's often cooly and windy, even in summer, but if I drive like five minutes east, or 15 minutes through the tunnel to go inland, it's absolutely perfect.
Bottom line, I really wouldn't stress out too much about living in one of the better climates of the world. It's like "dating down" from a supermodel to just a regular model. Not a bad problem to have.
Skyway, if you end up in the East Bay, I don't think you'll have too much trouble adapting to the weather. It's all relative. Compared to 99% of the country, the weather is great. It's only the SoCal'ers who can't handle anything. Seriously, try living anywhere east of the Rockies that's not South Florida. Even the deep south gets way colder than the Bay Area ever does. I live in Emeryville near Oakland, and we get tons of sunshine much of the year. Yes, winter can be gloomy, but in CA, it's always feast or famine with the rain. Last year, it was 75 F in January. This year, rain. I would not say that it's anything even remotely close to, say, the PNW. You'll have three months of fairly cloudy and damp weather, but with definite breaks, and some years, even a week or two of sun at a time even in winter. But most of the year, it's pretty good.
My only complaint about SF/Oakland weather is that it's not usually that warm until you get into downtown Oakland and south, away from the effect of the fog rushing in through the Golden Gate. Where I live, it's often cooly and windy, even in summer, but if I drive like five minutes east, or 15 minutes through the tunnel to go inland, it's absolutely perfect.
Bottom line, I really wouldn't stress out too much about living in one of the better climates of the world. It's like "dating down" from a supermodel to just a regular model. Not a bad problem to have.
I wholeheartedly agree. I'm from SoCal, but I've lived in other cities around the country (NYC, Phoenix) and spent extensive time overseas (Philippines), and the weather in NorCal (albeit a small PART of NorCal) is actually some of the best in the country (especially the peninsula below San Mateo). In fact, I wouldn't even say its 'dating down' from a supermodel to a regular model. It's more like a lateral move between extremely gorgeous supermodels.
Unfortunately, NorCal weather is not the 'typical conception' of what 'California climate' is supposed to be because it happens to have a bit more rain and cloudy days than SoCal. It actually irks me a lot that so many of my friends from SoCal complain incessantly about the weather, but then talk about how they want to move to NYC. What a joke, right? This isn't SoCal. There's somewhat different topography and different water temperatures that bring different forces at work.
However, the thing about the Bay Area's climate that brings a smile to me at least is the abundance of natural Redwood and Oak trees throughout the Bay Area (except for the extreme outer East Bay or Santa Clara County southeast of San Jose). Just take a drive, make a comparison between the Santa Cruz mountains (along Skyline Blvd.) and the Santa Monica Mountains (along Mullholland Highway or Topanga Canyon). You'll see the difference that a few inches of rain gets.
In the end, its all preference. I simply happen to be able to adapt to both, except when it gets too foggy in Berkeley in the middle of the summer. It's variations on almost the same things.
I haven't made up my mind completely yet to be honest. On the plus side, I actually love the summer temps in SF. I could care less if it's not hot in the summer. My issue would just be going extensive periods with limited to no sun. As far as summer fog, I'm confident I'd be fine just spending time in North Beach and FiDi etc for sun. Winter seems to be different. Just dealing with a few days of rain and overcast here as we have lately is all I want to deal with. Thank goodness we have a sunny weekend forecast coming up. Yet I check the forecast for the Bay area and it seems like it's darn near always overcast and/or rainy every day this time of year. I think I'd have to feel like this has been a worse than average year for the Bay area in terms of sun.
I would live directly in the city for at least a while should I move. But I'd also like to feel like there are a couple of appealing options outside of the city for down the road. I haven't checked those areas out enough yet. I will say I've spent time in SSF and walked down into San Bruno once. Very unappealing. So much so that I decided not to venture further south into Burlingame etc as I had originally planned to do on my last trip. Admittedly, I did want to hang out in the city some more and realize it's not fair to judge all points south of the city based on SSF and San Bruno....but...they did leave me with a general feeling of disinterest in anything outside the city. And parts east or north of the city obviously would involve a commute over (or under) the Bay. So, I dunno
Lifeshadower, I actually did grow up in the far East Bay (Mt Diablo Foothills) and, as you mentioned, we didn't have the redwoods out there. It was too dry and hot, but we did have some nice oak groves in shady canyons. Personally, I prefer the more sparse landscape to the redwoods, because you get nice vistas instead of being closed in. But the redwoods are nice to visit nearby.Skyway31, you definitely should check out the towns on the Peninsula. It sucks right outside of SF (San Bruno, etc) but gets nicer as you get south of the airport into Burlingame, San Mateo, Palo Alto, etc. Really nice towns.If I were you, I would definitely not move too far out of SF, or what's the point of moving, right? But I would also definitely avoid anything west of Twin Peaks or you will be miserable. As mentioned, I grew up in a very sunny warm climate and also hate the SF weather. But it's the summers you have to worry about, not the winters. The summers bring months of marine layer in July and August in those western parts of the city. The rest of the Bay Area has sunshine each day. Winters do get rain, but again, I've never seen weeks on end of cloudy weather. Even now, the forecast is for sunshine starting tomorrow, with a stretch of sun and mid-60s. That's not bad at all.
I haven't made up my mind completely yet to be honest. On the plus side, I actually love the summer temps in SF. I could care less if it's not hot in the summer. My issue would just be going extensive periods with limited to no sun. As far as summer fog, I'm confident I'd be fine just spending time in North Beach and FiDi etc for sun. Winter seems to be different. Just dealing with a few days of rain and overcast here as we have lately is all I want to deal with. Thank goodness we have a sunny weekend forecast coming up. Yet I check the forecast for the Bay area and it seems like it's darn near always overcast and/or rainy every day this time of year. I think I'd have to feel like this has been a worse than average year for the Bay area in terms of sun.
I would live directly in the city for at least a while should I move. But I'd also like to feel like there are a couple of appealing options outside of the city for down the road. I haven't checked those areas out enough yet. I will say I've spent time in SSF and walked down into San Bruno once. Very unappealing. So much so that I decided not to venture further south into Burlingame etc as I had originally planned to do on my last trip. Admittedly, I did want to hang out in the city some more and realize it's not fair to judge all points south of the city based on SSF and San Bruno....but...they did leave me with a general feeling of disinterest in anything outside the city. And parts east or north of the city obviously would involve a commute over (or under) the Bay. So, I dunno
Well if your issue is a desire to live in a sunny area year round, you're clearly on the wrong track if you're considering SF. Try SoCal, Hawaii or any sunbelt city. You should already know that SF is not reputed to be sunny year round, and the only reason people here are pointing out that it is sunny sometimes is b/c it wrongfully gets labeled as being cold and foggy/gloomy year round, which is clearly not the case either.
And (lol) San Bruno and SSF are not where you'd want to go to get away from SF, as they are still within the "fog belt" as I like to call it. South of 380 (near the airport) is where you begin to break out of that, so Burlingame on down is where the nicer weather is (and to a lesser degree in Millbrae). SSF and San Bruno are working class suburbs and you are correct, they are very unappealing. I've lived in both of them at different points. (They do have some great food though!)
Burlingame, San Mateo and Redwood City are an entirely different story. Weather-wise, charm-wise, you name it. You should head on down the Peninsula and check out the differences between them and the two that you've been to. And while you're at it you should check out some of the cities in other parts of the Bay that are relatively close to SF, like Alameda. There are actually quite a few gems throughout the Bay Area, and many are very different from each other. So if one or two don't appeal to you, you should keep exploring.
Burlingame is only 15 minutes or less driving from the City barring traffic, and San Mateo isn't much more than that depending on where you live - 30 minutes max, and that's if you don't know a good route to take (it used to take me only 12 minutes from my apartment in San Mateo to my old work in the Dogpatch around 3pm). Both are accessible by Caltrain in multiple locations, and Millbrae BART is right nearby as well. So living outside of the City is not really a big deal when you're in this area, and it can be much cheaper. If you want the "City experience," then you'd want to stay in SF, but if the weather is a huge issue, then many of the Peninsula cities are an excellent option.
I wholeheartedly agree. I'm from SoCal, but I've lived in other cities around the country (NYC, Phoenix) and spent extensive time overseas (Philippines), and the weather in NorCal (albeit a small PART of NorCal) is actually some of the best in the country (especially the peninsula below San Mateo). In fact, I wouldn't even say its 'dating down' from a supermodel to a regular model. It's more like a lateral move between extremely gorgeous supermodels.
Unfortunately, NorCal weather is not the 'typical conception' of what 'California climate' is supposed to be because it happens to have a bit more rain and cloudy days than SoCal. It actually irks me a lot that so many of my friends from SoCal complain incessantly about the weather, but then talk about how they want to move to NYC. What a joke, right? This isn't SoCal. There's somewhat different topography and different water temperatures that bring different forces at work.
However, the thing about the Bay Area's climate that brings a smile to me at least is the abundance of natural Redwood and Oak trees throughout the Bay Area (except for the extreme outer East Bay or Santa Clara County southeast of San Jose). Just take a drive, make a comparison between the Santa Cruz mountains (along Skyline Blvd.) and the Santa Monica Mountains (along Mullholland Highway or Topanga Canyon). You'll see the difference that a few inches of rain gets.
In the end, its all preference. I simply happen to be able to adapt to both, except when it gets too foggy in Berkeley in the middle of the summer. It's variations on almost the same things.
Great post (as usual ) and I totally agree. I fully enjoy both as well and can adapt to either one. I personally prefer the air quality that comes with the West Bay fog, and the cooling off effect that we get. But at the same time the consistent warm weather in SoCal is amazing too. I think the best overall IMO outside of the Bay is in the Solvang-to-Santa Barbara region.
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