Captain Dan Photo Bombs Silicon Valley
What do you do when you have a few hours to kill in Cupertino? That’s easy. You find as many of the corporate headquarters that are now iconic and photo bomb their signs.
We were in San Jose on a combination work, play, explore and collect data trip recently when we found we had the better part of a Sunday open. Let’s go visit Silicon Valley! While the valley is not an official place, it is a well known area near Santa Clara, San Jose, Mountain View, CA etc. What used to be the Prune capital of the world is now the epicenter of high tech creativity. It is amazing how some of these companies have changed the way the world operates. I don’t think five years ago you would have seen people on walks glued to their smart phones like they are today. Personally I don’t think this is an advancement for society but it shows how mobile we have become. Many fortunes have been made and lost over the last few decades right here in Silicon Valley. Driving around in our Yaris rental car we were literally run off the road by expensive cars that I had never even seen before and giant SUV’s with 20’s something drivers who have already made their fortune.
As an option trader in the 1990’s, I personally witnessed the explosion of internet companies and the rise of companies like Cisco Systems who once were considered innovative giants. Visiting the Cisco campus on this trip it looked pretty much like any corporate campus in America. Maybe just a little bigger. After all, if my memory serves me right at one point Cisco was the largest corporation in the world by market cap.
It’s funny when you visit the Googleplex there is so clearly a young vibrant culture even though Google itself is approaching middle age in tech world terms. Our thirty five year old son joined us for part of this trip as we had an opportunity to visit Pintetest Headquarters in SFO. (not Silicon Valley – but certainly worthy of a story in itself) Anyway, as we walked around campuses like Google and Apple it was apparent that our son could have been the father to some of these kids working there.
It really is amazing how close so many of these companies are located to each other. I would imagine that it makes stealing talent much easier when the pools of creative employees are so close to each other.
Here is our photo bombing day in a slideshow:
[new_royalslider id=”78″]
Or if you prefer, here are the pictures spread out.
What a fun day! We got to see these companies old and new and get a glimpse into their culture. I wish I was 22 again. If you are ever in San Jose and have some time, take a tour of these amazing corporate campuses.
