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Explore
the history, lore and architecture of California with “everybody’s favorite guide.’’ Walks
start from locations accessible by public transit and are repeated several
times for your convenience.
Sunday, May 18th 9a.m.-5:30 p.m.
Chinese History in the South Bay
(San Jose)
Historian Gary Holloway will lead a one-day coach tour from CHS to the South Bay to visit historic sites where the Chinese community lived and worked. Local Chinese historian Dr. Rod Lum will join Gary in visiting a replica of the 1888 Ng Shing Gung Temple (now a museum), as well as lead us to the sites of the five Chinatowns in San Jose. The day will also include a visit to the fabulous stone wall built by Chinese laborers at the Folger Estate in nearby Woodside.
This fully escorted trip will include a dim sum lunch at a local Chinese restaurant, (All costs covered by paid reservation). We will travel via a Mercedes-built luxury coach, complete with a full kitchen, driven by John Pettersen of Daytripping of Santa Rosa, who has driven us on other CHS adventures.
Saturday-Sunday, June 7th-8th, 9 a.m. on Saturday to 6 p.m. Sunday
Following the Golden River
(Sacramento)
If you are a CHS member click below.
If you are a Non-member click below.
The history of the Chinese in California began in the late 1840’s, when they arrived for the Gold Rush. Historian Gary Holloway will lead this two-day overnight coach tour as we follow the Chinese of the Gold Rush days up the Golden River (the Sacramento) to reach the Golden Mountain (California). Commencing at Dai Fow (Big City or San Francisco), we’ll head through California’s delta country, stopping to explore Locke, our state’s only Chinese agricultural community. Ninety-two-year-old Connie King, known as “Locke Mom” will lead a tour of the town. The Gold Rush Chinese were agrarian people, originally from the Pearl River Delta near Canton and Hong Kong. Here in California, they planted pears and built levees in the Great Central Valley, from Marysville in the north to Stockton, following their emigration to the Mother Lode to “work and move the Mountain”. We’ll drive atop these levees as we travel from Locke to Yee Fow, the 2nd City or Sacramento, formerly home to three Chinese temples.
In Sacramento we’ll visit the California State Railroad Museum to learn of the work on the transcontinental railroad by Chinese laborers, have a Chinese banquet at the legendary California Fats restaurant in Old Sacramento, and stay overnight in historically-rich downtown Sacramento.
On day two, we’ll have a special visit to the former Chinatown site at Sutter’s Lake, now on private property, we’ll make history as the first group to ever be allowed to enter this property. Then we’ll drive north to Sam Fow or 3rd City – Marysville, where we’ll have a docent led tour of the Bok Kai Temple, walk through the Chinatown, and explore the Chinese American Museum of Northern California. Our final stop that day will be at the historic Oroville Chinese “Joss” House and Museum, where we’ll enjoy a docent-led tour. From here, we will return to CHS in downtown San Francisco.
Walkabouts, 2008
May 2nd, 3rd, and 4th
Pacifica Tour and Tea
(San Mateo County)
This Coastal City occupies several wave-cut terraces and valleys just south of San Francisco. The Portola Expedition of Discovery came through here in 1769, encountering San Francisco Bay for the first time. Originally part of the Mission Dolores lands, Rancho San Pedro was carved out and given to the Sanchez Family in the 1840s. In 1905, the new Ocean Shore Railroad came through the area, en-route to Santa Cruz, and subdivided several areas, selling lots for $10 down, with $3-a-month payment plans! The Railroad failed by 1920, but the five wee villages survived, and grew slowly over the next few decades. In 1957, the five joined to form the City of Pacifica, giving it the very distinctive neighborhoods of Edgemar, Salada Beach, Brighton Beach, Vallemar and San Pedro Terrace. On this walk we’ll see the historic downtown area that began as Salada Beach, laid out rigidly on a flat coastal terrace. Passing old churches, homes from various architectural periods and an oceanfront Promenade offering us an unsurpassed view of the wide, blue Pacific. Our ramble will end at the wonderful Scottish tea salon, Tranquilitea, in the historic downtown area, where we will enjoy a full Afternoon High Tea consisting of tea sandwiches, scones, Scottish shortbread, salad and pots of tea. Our “themed tea” will be based on the fuchsia, the official flower of the City. By the way, the symbol of the City is the head of the statue of Pacifica from the Golden Gate International Exposition, the 1939 and 1940 World’s Fair on Treasure Island.
Walk and parking are easy. Walk will commence at 2pm each day, with our “tea date” at 3:30pm.
May 23rd, 24th, and 25th
Chinatown
(San Francisco)
San Francisco’s exotic Chinatown is the oldest and largest in the nation. Originally called Dai Fow or Big City, it became the home to thousands of newly landed immigrants over the last 160 years. On this walk, we will trek through its streets and narrow lanes and alleys. Commencing at one of the City’s busiest parks, we will thread our way along various paths to recall our state’s first public school, where the U.S. flag was first raised, the oldest Asian bakery in the U.S., several Taoist and Buddhist temples, a new semi-mall, and a playground honoring a Chinese-American basketball player. You will come away with a new appreciation of the City’s most fascinating neighborhood – Chinatown. Come and treat yourself to a special meal of afternoon tea at any one of hundreds of restaurants in the area. Walk is easy. Parking is not, so use the Portsmouth Plaza public parking garage, accessed on Kearny Street, between Washington and Clay Streets. This walk perfectly complements our current exhibit at CHS, “The Chinese of California: A Struggle for Community”, so be sure to stop in and check it out!
July 11th, 12th, and 13th
Telegraph Hill
(San Francisco)
One of the legendary seven hills of San Francisco, Telegraph was originally named La Loma Alta (“high hill”) by the Spanish. The telegraph was actually a system of flags constituting a semaphore or signaling device, to advise the settlement at Yerba Buena Cove of incoming ships through the Golden Gate. This aerie offers unsurpassed vistas in all directions, and we shall see these on this walk. Next, we’ll ascend the Hill via a MUNI public bus, and have a look at the famous Coit Tower murals of the 1930s. Then, we’ll set foot on the Filbert Steps to descend the eastern side of the Hill, to Levis Plaza. Finding the City’s original shoreline, we’ll circle the Hill to the south and come along Broadway, past the old Battery Point and Mormon immigrants landing place and course our way up Grant Avenue and return to Washington Square to honor the spiritual heart of the neighborhood, SS Peter and Paul Church. Walk is easy, with downhill portions. Parking is very challenging, so we strongly advise that you come and go via public transit.
August 1st, 2nd, and 3rd
Calistoga
(Napa County)
The small City of Calistoga sits at the top of the beautiful Napa Valley. Founded by Mormon Sam Brannan as a health resort, it capitalized on the many hot springs in the area, and grew into a supply point for the rich vineyards and silver and mercury mines in the area. In 1920, a local man began bottling the sparkling mineral water, and an industry was born, with Calistoga Water known all over the world today. On this walk we’ll see the attractive downtown area along Lincoln Avenue and walk the shady backstreets of the town to find some rare examples of Brannan’s Cottages from the 1860s, as well as a wealth of Victorian homes and a replica of the famous Russian chapel at Fort Ross on the Sonoma Coast. Many of you enjoyed our walks in nearby St. Helena last year, so come with us once again to this fabled valley and experience another classic town. Walk and parking are easy.
August 15th, 16th, and 17th
Ocean View
(San Francisco)
This is a new walk and should not be confused with the Ocean View walk we did on the Berkeley waterfront a couple years ago. This neighborhood is one of the most remote in San Francisco, and is often missed by even City residents. Located on the south or back side of Merced Heights, where we walked a year ago, the area got its start from a small depot built on the 1864 San Francisco and San Jose Railroad, in the middle of a large dairy-area. It grew very slowly due to a lack of paved or even locatable streets, laid out several “homestead” or realty associations. In 1906 the Ocean Shore Railroad came through the area and built another depot. The neighborhood gradually filled with Italians, Germans, Irish and many families with Eastern European roots, who liked the “country living in the City”. On this walk we’ll see the blocks of humble homes, many built as farm houses, where chickens, cows and vegetables ruled. Walk and parking are easy.
October 3rd, 4th, and 5th
Suisun City
(Solano County)
Suisun is the Patwin word for “west wind”, and the Suisines tribe has lived in the area for over 10,000 years, as the people of the tules and sloughs. The town developed in the Gold Rush period as a transshipment point for Fairfield and the goldfields. Its sloughside location offered access to the waters of the delta and Carquinez Strait, as well as the new transcontinental railroad line through the marsh area, connecting it to the Bay Area, Sacramento and points east. On this exciting walk, we’ll explore the old and new parts of this small, and historic city, filled with Victorian homes and enticing restaurants, and witness the transformation from a small industrial city with flour and lumber mills and canneries, to an up-and-coming suburban city. Walk and parking are easy.
October 31st, November 1st and 2nd
Mission Dolores Village and Cemetery
(San Francisco)
The settlement around the historic Mission San Francisco de Asis, or Mission Dolores, dates back to 1776, and is the oldest City neighborhood. It consisted of small 2-3 acre farm plots with a few scattered adobe cottages and some random livestock, all clustered about the Mission building. As the soil was not fertile, there were no orchards or major agricultural developments. With the secularization of the Mission in the 1830s, Don Jose Jesus de Noe obtained the land in his Rancho San Miguel Grant, and by the 1850s was selling off bits and pieces of it for great profit. As the City’s grid pattern of streets was extended after the 1850s, the Mission site became integrated into the fabric of the City, and the older adobes disappeared one by one, so that none of them exist today. On this walk, we’ll find some of the original village streets, and learn how the Mission cemetery shrank to its currently diminutive size. Additionally, to honor the Day of the Dead, and All Hollow’s Eve, we shall enter the Mission Cemetery and look at the headstones of many of our early California governors, prominent families and civic leaders, all laying in wait for us. Scenes from Hitchcock’s “Vertigo” and legends of poltergeists await us on this Halloween Howl of a walk. Walk is easy and parking is challenging. Be sure to bring $2 dollars to pay the entrance fee for the Mission and cemetery. Public transit is easy and a block away on Market Street.
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