I was in the Bay Area last Sunday after a conference trip and a very good week long R&R with friends in Los Angeles. ravi was there too hanging out with his brother and family on his winter break. We had decided to meet up earlier via email.

We both had lunches with relatives/family earlier in the day so we decided to meet at the MountainView Caltrain station near downtown at around 3:30 pm. I was dropped off there by relatives and met up ravi, who I didn't really recognise since he had cut off his hair. I hadn't met him before. Thankfully he was driving his brother's car so we were mobile as against being forced to hang out on the one and only Castro street. We consulted a few maps and debated what to do in the last couple of remaining hours of daylight. From prior knowledge we ditched Palo Alto and Sunnyvale downtowns, and he suggested Shoreline Park. It turned out to be very good. Large open spaces, two lakes, a golf course, lots of walking, and lots of chatting and catching up. It soon became dark so we decided to head out to Castro street.

MountainView downtown (Castro Street) and PaloAlto downtown (University Avenue) are apparently the only two streets with a life in the entire Bay Area. A couple of beers at a couple of pubs was the plan, but lo and behold, we find none on Castro. There was one sad looking sports bar and tons of restaurants, but no chilled out place. As we neared the end of the street and downtown a life-saver in the form of an Irish pub called St. Stephen's Green appeared and we trooped in. We had some nice ales, and local stuff. We chatted a bit more about life, the universe, and everything. Another friend joined us at 7:30 pm and it was time for ravi to split. To be fair to Castro, my friend showed me another very small hidden pub later. It was nice meeting you ravi dude. All the best with your plans.

My friend's wife works at Stanford, so he decided to drive me around there. That was cool by me as I hadn't seen that campus anyway. It was good, and we decided to hit University Avenue, again searching for a beer and food. The first pub Rudy's we walked in to sucked and we bolted out. Apparently the place is livelier when the students are around. I can imagine that - but for now the whole street was dead. And we weren't even there at India style dinner times. Anyway we ate at an Italian place, had some good wine and pasta, and called it quits.

Tags: bay area, caltrain, lj meet, mountain view, palo alto, ravi, stanford
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