Girlfriend looking at job in Sacramento

[StuckinBFE]

Hello California DUers.

My girlfriend is looking at a job around the Sacramento area and I was curious what it is like down there. So far the company really likes her and she is pretty interested in them. If she ends up taking the job I will probably move down there in the next six months and I was curious what the Sacramento area is like.

We are both big outdoors people and love maintaining biking, hiking, camping, fishing, etc...

Also I was curious what the job scene is like, I have a degree in electrical engineering and have worked as a sales engineer for the past year at a local engineering company.

Any thoughts or comments would be helpful. Thank you.

[Syncronaut Seven]

1. Kinda sucky, brown air, traffic,

Does put you within a days drive or less of many interesting places. You get to catch melons and tomatoes as they fall off the trucks in front of you. I suppose that's a benefit.

[StuckinBFE]

2. I do like melons but I do not like raw tomatoes

I will put that in the undecided column, thanks for the info.

I did a google search and it appears that there is some good mountain biking around, is that true???

[Syncronaut Seven]

Yes, I don't bike much anymore but Cali has many places to do that

We just got back from a year in LA, drove thru Sacramento a few times, even stopped for lunch once but it felt like the kind of place that said "just keep on going".

Would sell my soul to live anywhere along hwy 1/101 between Santa Barbara and Monterey. I had to be dragged screaming from Big Sur, there are pictures.

Sure you all wouldn't like Portland better? Lots of progressives here. In a lifetime you couldn't possibly bike all the trails within a 3 hour drive. :hippie:

[StuckinBFE]

5. I would love to move back to oregon

I grew up in Bend and moved to Bozeman, MT after high school. I love the outdoors of Montana but I am tired of A. Being in the middle of no where, B. The cold ass winters, and C. The dumbass bush supports, granted bozeman has less then the rest of the state.

I have never mountain biked in Portland but I have road a couple hundred miles of the trails in Bend.

[Sequoia]

3. I tried to live there years ago. Very hot, boring and the streets are

named after the alphabet. I don't recommend it but where do you live now? Sac-o-tomatoes is not exactly a hip town.

[StuckinBFE]

6. I live in Montana now

Me and my girlfriend are trying to head anywhere on the west coast. I would prefer Oregon or Seattle area but this is where she is getting a job interview.

[tmooses]

4. Just moved from that area a couple years ago. After spending most

my life in Bay Area I found it very conservative with many of my coworkers freeper types. The county I was living in (Placer) had the highest Repub registration of any county in California. I enjoyed trips up to the Sierras but got tired of those summer string of 20 or so days plus 90 degrees.

[luxpara]

7. UC Davis is the best and biggest employer - as far as I can tell -

Sacto isn't bad if you live in Midtown (younger, hipper). I moved her from the Bay Area and would love to move back there, but it Sac does have the most interesting stuff if you live near the central valley.

[musiclawyer]

8. Ignore any posters who have not lived here.

Sac town good points

1. Because of government, economy is pretty stable. Jobs tend to be available for people with fungible skills

2. The city and surroundings are very livable. Not even the rush hour is that bad compared to other cities. You don't see it up there in the high rankings for crime.

3. Very culturally diverse. Not a lot of snootiness.

4. You are 90 minutes from skiing and 90 minutes from the surf. Lots of outdoor recreation much closer and right in town.

5. For the most part full of open minded folks. Not really a republican town, although some foothill suburbs can be quite red.

Sac town bad points.

1. Hotter than hell in summer, very foggy in winter, although there are lots of places with worse weather

2. Very provincial. The local paper is very local.

3. Cultural amenities aplenty but not really world class. Opera, theatre, etc....got to drive 90 minutes to San Francisco

[robertarctor]

9. As a longtime resident, I'll agree with that

And add that the American River Parkway bike trail, which starts at Discovery Park (at the confluence of the Sacramento and American Rivers) and winds east and north to Folsom Lake, is one of the area's jewels. I spend as much time on it as I can, and you indicated that you like biking, which is why I'm mentioning it.

For a long time, Sacramento's proximity to other places was a major selling point—90 miles from San Francisco, less than an hour from the Napa Valley, an hour and a half to Tahoe. But now it takes a lot longer to get to San Francisco because of traffic.

I have to admit that I liked the town better before Governor Boobengrabber got foisted into office, because I prefer old-school California funk to West L.A. glitz. Nevertheless, there are a lot of things that make this place pretty livable—decent ethnic restaurants, a music scene that ebbs and flows but harbors some nice gems, and a vibrant local art scene. And there's a nice ethnic diversity here, too, and we seem to get along pretty well.

PM me if you decide to move here and I'll give you the nickel tour.

[Ernesto]

18. You forgot that ......

we have a pretty good Air America station (KSAC).
I live out in Wilton (south east corner of the county) where I bicycle every morning on nearly empty country roads.
As a well-retired construction worker, I thank my lucky stars that Sac is a pretty good UNION town.
PS... My boat is moored 40 minutes away in the California Delta & the salmon will be here in early October!

[StuckinBFE]

22. Salmon? What kind and what are the seasons?

I haven't been salmon fishing in a many years but I have tripped planned to meet up with my parents in October for the run up in Oregon. And if I move out to CA I hoping to buy my grandfather's boat back from my Aunt to do some fishing out there.

[Ernesto]

28. Check this amigo.......

This a very early season catch shown @ my home port.
http://vieiras95641.tripod.com/id7.html

[Silver Gaia]

24. I'm a resident, and I agree with musiclawyer...

Midtown is great... very open-minded people, culturally diverse, and liberal. The outlying areas are more conservative. I should add that property prices are outrageous in all but a few areas of town, though (as they are everywhere in California). If you plan to rent, you should be OK, though. There are some nice rentals that aren't toooo pricey, although they get snatched up fast in midtown.

And musiclawyer is correct that you'd be within a few hours drive at the most of just about any terrain that might interest you... mountains, seashore, desert, redwood forests, wine country. As for big city life, San Franciso, Berkeley, etc. are really just a short drive away. It's not so bad a place to be. I moved here in 1998 and have enjoyed it quite a lot.

One thing no one has mentioned that I really love about Sacramento is all the TREES. I read somewhere that the only city with more trees per capita is Paris... don't know if that is true, but it sure appears so. When driving across the bridge over the Sacramento River and looking out over the city, you see TREES... the skyscrapers stick out, of course, but the streets are lined with huge old trees all over downtown, so you see treetops, not buildings. I like that a LOT.

And yes, it can get hotter'n hell here in the summer, but it's a dry heat, not humid, and we get the Delta Breeze at dusk that always cools things right down. The winters are very mild with it rarely ever dipping down low enough to even frost. But it is wet and rainy a lot in the winter. Summers are dry with rain extremely rare from late May to November, then the rains kick in and it is mostly rainy (no snow) and foggy until late May again. I'm a gardener, and our climate is a Mediterranean type climate. Damn near everything grows here. I have tomato plants that are 6 feet tall! And flowers that I think of as annuals are actually perennials in this climate.

I hope the comments of those of us who are residents will be of some use to you. It's not so bad at all here, really. Good luck on the job interview and impending move! :)

[StuckinBFE]

10. THANK YOU EVERYONE

I just wanted to say thank you for all the good input so far. She flies out next week to go visit the company so I will know more when she returns. Again thank you and everyones great insight is why I think DU is great.

[cally]

11. I liked Sacramento when I lived there

I lived near downtown for years. I agree with the others who have lived there. Sacto has a bad reputation but that's from folks who haven't lived there. As you leave the city center, it does get more conservative and suburban though. Housing is very expensive.

Good luck.

[Conservativesux]

12. And housing is going to get more expensive. No wonder people

are leaving the state for cheaper housing.

[Conservativesux]

13. Sacramento is better then Stockton any day of the week, IMO.

Lots more crime, street gangs and blatent poverty in Stockton then in Sac-town, so count yourself lucky, if you can get used to the summer heat and all the ag trucks rolling down the highways spewing dust and tomatoes, that is.

[robertarctor]

14. I grew up in Stockton

And I'll never go back to San Joaquin County to live. Fuck that locus of corruption. That place is jinxed.

[anitar1]

15. It is jinxed! I lived there for 3 years, in Modesto area.

Still have relatives there and it is 5 times as bad now. Horrible traffic, lots of crime ect.Gives me the creeps to think of going back there.

[Xithras]

16. It's not so bad.

I live in Salida. The crimerate is about average for California, the traffic may be bad in comparison to other cities in other states but it has NOTHING on the Bay Area or LA.

My only problem with this area is the huge numbers of freepers, and even they are gradually being diluted by the influx of people from the Bay Area. If we could get the sprawl under control, this could actually be a nice area to live in a decade or so.

[robertarctor]

17. Wow, Salida?

That town was a notorious "speed trap" on Highway 99 when I was a kid. It was just over the Stanislaus County line from Dutchville (Ripon), and I recall my dad and uncles bitching about getting pulled over and ticketed there. Kinda weird to think of it becoming the victim of suburban sprawl; in my memory, the place still reeks of dairies.

Beg to differ on Stockton, though. That place is depressing. It's built on wave after wave of cheap labor: Chinese to build the railroads, Filipinos to drain the swamps and build levees in the Delta, blacks to work at the shipyards during the war, Mexicans and Dust Bowl Okies to work in the fields, with plenty of old-school hardass California rednecks and Mediterranean ethnics to crack the whips. It's a laboratory of California-style feudalism in action. And at one time, San Joaquin County had the highest percentage of residents receiving public assistance in the nation.

Sorry, but I'll take Sacramento over Stockton any day.

[Xithras]

19. Wow, you haven't been out here in a long time!

For all practical purposes, sprawl has turned all of the towns along 99 in Stanislaus County into one big city. Salida now extends all the way to the Stanislaus river, so once you enter the county you're immediately in a town. Modesto and Salida ran together about 10 years ago so there's no longer a gap there. Modesto and Ceres ran together alongside the highway decades ago. There's only about a 1/2 mile (two farms) separating Ceres and Keyes at this point. South of Keyes, you only get to admire one mile of farmland before running into Turlock, and Turlock now extends all the way to the Merced County line. Cross that, and you've only got a few hundred yards to Delhi.

For all practical purposes, sprawl has created one massive urban area that extends from the north edge of Ripon in San Joaquin county through the south edge of Delhi in Merced County, with only three very small breaks.

Salida hasn't been the little 5 street town you remember in about 15 years.

[robertarctor]

21. FBI Data Show Stockton Has Highest Violent Crime Rate

Link here: http://www.news10.net/storyfull1.asp?id=12134

The place hasn't changed much in that regard.

[Gyre]

20. Some people think it's getting ready for a real estate

"correction". Summer just hit with a vengence: 100+ for the last 2 weeks. Big singles area. Mountains are 2 hours away, the ocean about the same. Sac is the state capitol so there's lots of government employees around and not alot of hiring in that sector (since we're still in a recession of sorts). I personally hate Sacramento, but Davis is a nice town to live in.:)

Gyre

[Oerdin]

23. Sacramento sucks.

After college I got a job in Sacramento working as a Geologist and the town just sucked. I came from San Diego which is mostly a clean, nice, and multicultural city so I found Sacramento to be small, dirty, and extremely run down. The weather sucked & urban sprawl was wayout of control.

[robertarctor]

25. Thanks for your opinion

Some of us have grown to like this town. The city has changed a lot in the 20 years I've been living here. The weather ... well, yeah, the heat takes some getting used to. The sprawl isn't any worse than you'll find in southern California. And our wingnut Republicans are no crazier than yours. So what's your point?

[Oerdin]

26. My point is...

The man asked for personal opinions and I gave him mine.

[robertarctor]

27. Fair enough

And I can accept that you think this place sucks.