California Travel Guide

California is on the west coast of the USA. Its terrain and climate varies greatly. California is the most populous state of the United States. Located on the Pacific coast of North America, it is bordered by Oregon, Nevada, Arizona and Mexico. The state's four largest cities are Los Angeles, San Diego, San José and San Francisco. California is known for its pleasant climate and ethnically diverse population. The state presently has 58 counties.

Inhabited by indigenous people for several millennia, California was first colonized by the Spanish in 1769, and gained independence becoming part of Mexico in 1821. Following a brief period as the independent California Republic in 1846, California was annexed by the United States that same year, but wasn't actually admitted to the Union until Millard Fillmore officially made California the thirty-first state on September 9, 1850.

California's diverse geography ranges from the sandy beaches of the Pacific to the rugged, snow capped Sierra Nevada mountains in the east. The central portion of the state is dominated by the California Central Valley and the San Joaquin Valley, one of the most vital agricultural areas in the country. The Yosemite Valley, famous for its glacially-carved cliffs, is located near the California-Nevada border, and ancient redwood trees dot the Northern Californian coastline. California is also home to the lowest and hottest place in the Western Hemisphere: Death Valley, located in the Mojave Desert.

The Gold Rush dramatically changed California with an influx of population and an economic boom. The early part of the 20th century was marked by California becoming the center of the entertainment industry in addition to the beginning of growth of a large tourism sector. The Central Valleys are home to California's important large agricultural industry. In recent decades, California has become a global leader in computers and information technology. Indeed, if California were a country, it would rank as the 8th largest economy of the world.

California Travel Guide - Cities

* Bakersfield
* Fresno
* Los Angeles
* Sacramento
* San Diego
* San Francisco
* San Jose
* Palm Springs

California Travel Guide - Regions

* Southern California - Warm, crowded, home to the Los Angeles-San Diego megalopolis.
* The Desert - Palm trees, blazing sun, resorts.
* The Central Coast - Fertile and cool, remarkably comfortable.
* The San Joaquin Valley - Breadbasket of California.
* The Sacramento Valley - Home of the State Capital.
* The Sierra Nevada - California's alpine and skiing region.
* Gold Country - Historic foothills to the Sierras.
* The Bay Area - Unique, high-tech, and one of the most beautiful regions in the world with some of the most open minded individuals anywhere.
* Shasta Cascades - Hills and mountains in the state's northeast corner.
* The North Coast - Redwood trees, rugged coast.

California Travel Guide - Destinations

* Death Valley National Park
* Joshua Tree National Park
* Lassen Volcanic National Park
* Mojave National Preserve
* Pinnacles National Monument
* Redwood National Park
* Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks
* Yosemite National Park
* Disneyland
* Lake Tahoe
* Napa Valley - Spas, wine tasting, wine tours.
* Big Sur
* Rock Creek Lake

California Travel Guide - Get There

All major road and airport entrances (including entrances from other US States) to California have agricultural inspection stations to ensure that some fruits and vegetables do not cross into a region where they may come into contact with the farms in the Central Valley. Often, travellers are subject to border inspection (somewhat strict for domestic travel) and asked if they have been on a farm or are carrying organic matter with them. These measures are likely to be increasingly stringent as extreme biosecurity problems arise from travel-carried fruit and vegetables, imported plants and animals, or even from packing material that may carry bioinvader species.

California Travel Guide - Getting Around California

California is the third largest state in terms of land size, and is larger than many countries. However, getting around California can be quite simple. In addition to interstates and US highways, California has one of the most expansive state highway systems in the United States. As with all trips in the United States, a car is usually the best way to get around and see all destinations. However the trip from the top of California to the bottom can take well over ten hours. Flying may be a more reasonable option. Many major (like American and United) and low fare airlines (like jetBlue and Southwest) link cities within the state of California.

Beware that some major freeways may have potholes.

California Travel Guide - Things To Do

* Rudy Colombini's Center for the Performing Arts, 1353 Bush St, San Francisco, 415 240-5554. Music museum, cafe, nightclub, and performing arts space.
* Rock ‘n' Roll Hall of Fame, 1335 Bush St, San Francisco. Exhibits focused on musicians from San Francisco and who changed the San Francisco music scene.
* Raft the Tuolumne River, 6529 Telegraph Ave, Oakland. River rafting trips on the nearby Class IV Tuolumne River.
* Palm Springs International Film Festival, Palm Springs Held first 2 weeks of January. One of the largest film festivals in North America. Open to the public. Star studded black tie gala open to public with purchase of gala tickets.
* Palm Springs International Festival of Short Films, Palm Springs Largest short film festival in North America. 2nd largest in the world. An Academy sanctioned Festival. 50 of the short films screened at this festival have been nominated for Academy Awards. The public can meet up and coming directors and actors at special parties. Held Aug 24-30th, 2006.

California Travel Guide - Transportation

California's vast terrain is connected by an extensive system of freeways, expressways, and highways, all maintained by Caltrans and patrolled by the California Highway Patrol, except for the numbered expressways in Santa Clara County which were built and maintained by the county itself. The main north-south arteries are U.S. Route 101, which runs close to the coast from the state's border with Oregon to downtown Los Angeles, and Interstate 5, which runs inland from the Oregon to Mexico borders, bisecting the entire state. California is known for its car culture, and its residents typically take to the roads for their commutes, errands, and vacations, giving California's cities a reputation for severe traffic congestion. Almost all California highways are non-toll roads; however, there are a few toll roads, and most major bridges have toll plazas.

The state's most famous highway bridge is the Golden Gate Bridge, though there are major bridges elsewhere at Sacramento, Los Angeles, and San Diego.

As for air travel, Los Angeles International Airport and San Francisco International Airport are major hubs for trans-Pacific and transcontinental traffic. There are about a dozen important commercial airports and many more general aviation airports throughout the state's 58 counties.

California also has several important seaports. The giant seaport complex formed by the Port of Los Angeles and the Port of Long Beach in Southern California is the largest in the country and responsible for handling about a fourth of all container cargo traffic in the United States. The Port of Oakland handles most of the ocean containers passing through Northern California.

Intercity rail travel is provided by Amtrak. Los Angeles and San Francisco both have subway networks, in addition to light rail. San Jose, San Diego and Sacramento have only light rail, though portions of San Jose light rail serve as EL Trains. Metrolink commuter rail serves much of Southern California, and Caltrain commuter rail connects San Jose and Gilroy (commute hour only) to San Francisco. Altamont Commuter Express (ACE) connects Tracy, Livermore and other edge cities with San Jose. BART, an express rail service, connects San Francisco and Oakland to Millbrae in the southwest, Fremont in the southeast, Dublin and Pleasanton in the east, Richmond in the north, and Pittsburg in the northeast. Despite its name, it does not encompass the entire Bay Area; the North Bay and South Bay regions are not currently included in the system. San Diego has Trolley light rail and Coaster commuter rail services. Nearly all counties operate bus lines, and many cities operate their own bus lines as well.

Both Greyhound and Amtrak provide intercity travel services.

The rapidly growing population of the state is straining all of its transportation networks. A regularly recurring issue in California politics is whether the state should continue to aggressively expand its freeway network or concentrate on improving mass transit networks in urban areas.

The California High Speed Rail Authority was created in 1996 by the state to implement an extensive 700 mile (1127 km) rail system. Construction is pending approval of the voters during the November 2008 general election, in which a $9 billion state bond would have to be approved. If built, the system would provide a TGV-style high-speed link between the state's four major cities, and would allow travel between Los Angeles' Union Station and San Francisco's Transbay Terminal in two and one half hours.

California Travel Guide - Ecology

Ecologically, California is one of the richest and most diverse parts of the world and includes some of the most endangered ecological communities. California's diverse geography, geology, soils and climate have generated a tremendous diversity of plant and animal life. The State of California is part of the Nearctic ecozone, and spans a number of terrestrial ecoregions, and is perhaps the most ecologically diverse state in the United States.

California has a rather high percentage of endemic species. California endemics include relic species that have died out elsewhere, such as the Catalina Ironwood (Lyonothamnus floribundus). Many other endemics originated through differentiation or adaptive radiation, whereby multiple species develop from a common ancestor to take advantage of diverse ecological conditions. California's great abundance of species of California lilac (Ceanothus) is an example of adaptive radiation. Many California endemics have become endangered, as urbanization, logging, overgrazing, and the introduction of exotic species have encroached on their habitat.

California boasts several superlatives in its collection of flora; the largest trees, the tallest trees, and the oldest trees on earth are all found in California.

California's native grasses were perennials, which stayed green year-round in most of the state's subclimates. After European contact, these were generally replaced by invasive species of European annual grasses; and, in modern times, California's hills turn a characteristic golden brown in summer. California's nickname The Golden State is in reference to the golden brown summer hillsides and not to the California Gold Rush, as is sometimes stated.

National Parks and Monuments

To protect and preserve the state's biological diversity, natural beauty, and historic heritage, the U.S. National Park System has acquired control over a huge number of places within California. Please see the lists above for more information.

Some of the oldest and most popular national parks in the United States are located in California. The most prominent by far is Yosemite National Park (which protects Yosemite Valley), followed closely by the Kings Canyon-Sequoia National Park complex (which protects the most massive trees in the world) and Redwood National Park (which protects the tallest trees in the world).

Half Dome, in Yosemite, figures prominently on the reverse side of the California state quarter.

Rivers

California has several major rivers. Two very important rivers are the Sacramento River and the San Joaquin River. They drain the basin of the San Joaquin Valley and eventually flow to the Pacific Ocean through the San Francisco Bay. Two other important rivers are the Klamath River, in the north, and the Colorado River which drains into the Gulf of California. There are many other rivers around the california are and all of them have their importance in filling the lakes around the state. Some of the smaller river located in the San Bernardino mountain range provides fresh crystal clear water to nearby lakes within the mountain range such the Santa Ana River running through 7 Oaks, Forest Falls, Angelus Oaks and jenks lake.

California State Guide - Racial and Ancestral makeup

California lacks a majority ethnic group. It is one of four majority-minority states. In the 2000 Census, less than half of Californians were White American or non-Hispanic white, the first recorded statistic (except for Hawaii) of a "white minority" in any US state. More than a third were Hispanic or Latino of all races or at 9.9 million, followed by 12 percent Asian American and Pacific Islander, 7 percent African American or "black", and another 5 percent claimed biracial or multiracial origins. Only New Mexico and Texas have higher percentages of Latinos, but California has the highest number of any U.S. state, and Hawaii has a higher Asian American percentage than California.

The largest named ancestries in California are Mexican (25%), German (9%), Irish (7.7%), English (7.4%) and Filipino (6%), but includes 65 other ethnicities from to Hawaiian to Somali, a demographic profile to a high diverse state. Mexican Americans and Chicanos predominate in Southern California such as the Imperial Valley, the Central Valley, Salinas, and parts of the San Francisco Bay Area as well the largest ethnic group in Los Angeles County, California. Spanish and German ancestries are dominant in the eastern Sierra Nevada, the far north, and the North Coast. San Francisco has the greatest concentration of Asian Americans in the continental United States, with Chinese Americans numerous in San Francisco, Alameda, San Mateo, and Santa Clara counties. The San Francisco Bay Area has a greater concentration of Cantonese-speaking Chinese. Southern California has perhaps the largest Taiwanese American community in the United States particularly in San Gabriel Valley, and communities such as Cerritos, Irvine (in Orange County), and some in the South Bay, Los Angeles Area. Filipino Americans are particularly numerous in San Mateo and Solano counties, and in communities such as Artesia, Baldwin Park, Cerritos, Covina, West Covina, and the community of Eagle Rock in Los Angeles. There are large Korean American communities in Koreatown of Los Angeles as well as East San Gabriel Valley, Cerritos, South Bay, Los Angeles, and in North Orange County. South Bay, Los Angeles also has a large Japanese American community too. The City of Long Beach has one of the largest Cambodian American communities in the United States. The neighboring cities of Westminster and Garden Grove have the largest Vietnamese American community outside of Vietnam and is often dubbed "Little Saigon". The community of Artesia and nearby Cerritos, as well as Fremont in the Bay Area have a large Asian Indian/South Asian American community. In 2000, California also had the largest number of Bulgarian Americans than any other U.S. state, according to the 2000 Census, and also the most Hungarian Americans of any US state. California also has one of the largest numbers of Armenian Americans at 600,000 alone, and Persian Americans, with estimates of up to 500,000 persons in Southern California, and 20% of Beverly Hills being of Persian descent. California has the largest population of African Americans in the western U.S. Large African American communities are in Los Angeles, Long Beach, Oakland, Sacramento, and San Bernardino. San Diego and San Francisco also have sizeable black populations. African Americans are approximately 7 percent of the state population with many of them living in suburban communities. [citation needed]. California has the most Native American tribes either indigenous to the state and other U.S. regions, notably Cherokees are the highest number, and its' Native American population at 350,000 is the most of any state.

Article Source: Wikipedia