Lingo Life and Lore in San Jose

By Kim Boatman Nauman, FrontDoor.com | Published: 1/29/2009

Get to know these local places and roads to find your way around San Jose.

You'll need to know these phrases to negotiate your way around San Jose and the Bay Area.

• The Hill. Highway 17 winds its way up over the Santa Cruz mountains and down to the coast -- and Santa Cruz -- on the other side. It's a picturesque drive through stately redwood forests, with views of the fog-shrouded coast. It's also a mildly terrifying drive on rainy winter days. Locals refer to this stretch of 17 simply as "the hill."
• The City. It's enough to make San Jose politicos wince, but San Francisco is almost universally referred to as "the City."
• The Valley. The big sprawl that is San Jose also happens to be a valley lying between the mountains and the ocean. Back in the day of canneries and orchards, it was known as the Valley of Heart's Delight. These days it's Silicon Valley, often shortened to the Valley.
• The Peninsula. The stretch between San Jose and San Francisco is known as the Peninsula. It's a reference term that comes up quite frequently, to the confusion of visitors and newcomers.
• CalTrain or the train. The commuter train that runs between San Jose and San Francisco.
• Seventeen. 880. 680. 280. 101. Only in LA do the locals refer to their highways and interstates with a "the," as in "the 405." In the Bay Area, it's just 17 or 101. It helps to know that 280 becomes 680 in San Jose.

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