I will stay in the US for 2 weeks, between the 16th and 30th of june. I want to experience the American Way of Life. I want to visit San Francisco, of course, but I would like to do some “american” stuff: watch Nascar Racing (hopefully with an amazing pile-up with 50 cars), watch a football game and eat stadium hotdogs and all that stereotypical things Americans do in the movies. Would anyone have any tips? nice places to visit, maybe even on other states (if I could find a cheap plane ticket)?
Don’t expect to watch football. That’s normally played in autumn. June is the middle of baseball season, so you could take in a Giants game when you’re in San Francisco. You can get your stadium hot dogs then, too.
Baseball will be easier to watch than football. American football season doesn’t start until mid August.
Go to NASCAR.com to see where the circuit is racing when you are here. Go to MLB.com to find if and when the California teams, specifically the Giants if you are in San Fran
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The Giants have won three world championships since 2010 and are currently in first place in their division, so their games are especially good to watch right now.
I went to Candlestick Park when Alvin Dark was managing Willie Mays; my sister shook Juan Marichal’s hand the day he pitched a no-hitter* — so don’t accuse me of disloyalty.
But … if OP is unfamiliar with baseball he may be astounded to watch what is arguably the most boring sport ever invented by any hominid.
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- or maybe it was a one-hitter; my memory gets spotty.
Vegas, baby. It’s a quick cheap flight from San Francisco & every non American I have ever known has said there is no place like it on earth.
I guess it depends on your definition of “the American way of Life.” You want rustic Americana such as in “Field of Dreams”? Or more city life? Two weeks won’t get you out of California let alone to rural America where the townsfolk know your kids and will tell them and you in a heartbeat if they are out of line. Mt Rushmore is probably out as well as Yellowstone. Major city tour is all you really have time for. Planes or not. The US is really big without much in the way of public transit outside the metro areas. The rails connect metro areas not tourist destinations.
My remark may have seemed rude. Let me offer a more positive response.
Sports event is fine if you think you’d enjoy it. But just visiting museums, parks. coffee shops, nightclubs, or even just shopping or cruising interesting neighborhoods on foot might also lead to the interactions which would give a glimpse of “the American way.” There are plenty of interesting places in San Francisco or a quick bus/train ride away, and other fun places if you rent a car and drive for an hour or two.
You may get a slice of California life, but we’re talking about a country that has many different cultures. In order to get a taste you’re going to have to visit each region (Southwest, Midwest, South, Mid Atlantic, Northeast, etc) and spend several weeks in each.
Hell, I live here and I haven’t seen half the country.
Since you’re going to California if you’re planning to visit San Francisco think of it more like “experiencing California” and enjoy that. Things like NASCAR or sports you can view on the TV if there’s nothing of interest to you in the immediate vicinity. In fact, many life-long fans only view such events on TV so doing so is very American.
As others have said, the US is a very large, very diverse place. I’ve lived here over half a century and still have seen only a fraction of it. You’re not going to be able to get a comprehensive tour in just a couple weeks so pick a few highlights near your destination location and enjoy them.
Granted, San Francisco area will only get you a glimpse of one view of “American Life”. (You could spend a week being a tourist in Golden Gate Park alone, just about.) But that said, it’s a fabulously beautiful and picturesque area – especially if you venture a bit beyond The City and explore the surrounding regions as well – say, within a radius of 100 miles or so.
We’ve had several threads on this board on the topic of “Things To See And Do In/Around San Francisco”. (I’ve long wanted to create a compendium thread of links to all of those.) With a little investment of effort and some Google-fu, you should be able to find some of those threads.
You could organize and host a Bay Area Dopefest!
Breathe deeply of the succulent air of American freedom.
1)Buy a bunch of guns.
2)Eat a bunch of burgers, and everything, with cheese.
3)Go to a monster truck rally.
'Merica done.
ACTUALLY, I would gladly have a beer with a doper.
Thanks for the advice, guys. I think I will try to explore as much as I can. Vegas could be interesting, but I can only play blackjack (fairly well, I must say). But the city is so amazingly kitsch that I have to go there one day.
Ok, a monster truck rally seems amazingly fun!! Are they expensive? Are there monster truck rallies near by san francisco?
Since you are in California, you might try to get to Disneyland. It’s a major tourist destination for Americans. You will see Americans from all over the country on their own vacations, often on the trip of a lifetime. OK, it isn’t Disney World, in Florida, but many people still choose Disneyland-- anyone who is closer to California than Florida, or who wants to see Hollywood as well, or who want to see the original, since Disneyland came well before Disney World. I went to Disneyland as a child, before Disney World was built.
Baseball is not boring. It’s the only sport that matters. Just because it has fewer injuries than other sports does not make it boring. I’m from New York, and no matter how long I’ve lived in Indiana, you will never convince me basketball is a better sport. I can’t even follow basketball. Football is what’s boring, as far as I’m concerned, and as a scoring system weirder than tennis.
If you have a chance to see some of the protected forest, some of the old growth forest in California, that’s a very American thing. I honestly don’t know how far the giant redwoods are from San Francisco, but I do know that my parents and I did Disneyland, Fisherman’s Wharf, and the Redwood Forest in less than two weeks back in the 1970s.
Also, a very American thing to do would be to go to some of the forest that is abundant all over California, and go camping. An awful lot of Americans love to camp. I’m not one of them, but that’s probably because I got my fill of it for a lifetime in the military. There are lots of families who go camping for a week at a time every summer.
The Giants are only going to be at home 5 days during that period, and playing crappy teams to boot. Just sayin’.
Check out local listings in the CA central valley (Fresno, Modesto, Stockton…). You might be able to catch a rodeo. Nothing more American than that, and it won’t be too far from SF.
NASCAR is at the Sonoma Raceway about an hour’s drive from San Francisco on Friday, June 24 through Sunday June 26.
If you want to see redwoods, Muir Woods is about a half an hours drive north from the City, the Avenue of the Giants is about 4 hours north and Big Basin is about 1.5 hours south. Yosemite is about 4 hours east.