Luxury holidays in Palo Alto

In some ways, Palo Alto is a baby metropolis – while the Peninsula’s other major cities, San Francisco and San Jose were amassing skyscrapers pre-war, the nascent heart of Silicon Valley was a university town in a sea of farms and fields. However, that all changed in the Forties and Fifties as Stanford grew in standing (and size, sprawling out to encompass museums, galleries, concert venues and sculpture gardens), and Messrs Hewlett and Packard, William Shockley – and close by, Steves Jobs and Wozniak – started tinkering around in their garages, booting up a tech boom that’s only grown exponentially. The Meta campus and Googleplex may have moved since Palo Alto was their headquarters, albeit not very far, but these and it still fizzes with innovation. It’s a curious mix of flashy billionaires and less-so students, which has made the city’s social side a high-low mix of Michelin stars and ramen and hummus joints, lively cocktail hangs and wine-sniffing spots, and alt-indie shops neck and neck with blow-out brands.
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When to go

The city can be sweltering in summer, and the city doesn’t die down, but when students are on summer break there are slightly fewer events. October is the most clement time to check out the sights.

Getting there

  • Planes

    San Francisco and San Jose airports are equidistant from Palo Alto, each about a 90-minute drive away; both are well-connected, but ‘Frisco is a little more global.

  • Trains

    The Caltrain that crosses the Peninsula stops at Palo Alto station, but if you want to Amtrak it up and down the coast you’ll need to stop at San Jose.

  • Automobiles

    There’s no better place to hit the blacktop. Sitting at the business end of one of America’s most iconic road-tripping routes – to the west, Palo Alto gives way to giant redwoods, county parks and open-space preserves rife for the revving through. Plus, the city’s urban sprawl is easier to explore with a set of wheels.