Fremont is a suburban city in the South Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area. For the most part, people in Fremont work in the electronics industry, and usually commute to the Silicon Valley for work.

Mission Peak is visible throughout Fremont. Unlike most sprawling suburbs, Fremont was planned and was meant to be the way it is. In the 1950s, fearing that they would be annexed by the growing city of Hayward to the north, seven very small towns decided to unite to avoid annexation. The two towns closest to Hayward quickly incorporated into Union City. The six remaining towns got together and extensively planned how things would be. Space was allocated both for industry and homes. Space for roads large enough to support the massive traffic flows was set aside. One of the small cities (Newark) dropped out of the coalition because it was slated to become an industrial zone. The five cities annexed all the surrounding land to form Fremont.

The oldest of the small towns was Mission San Jose, a Spanish mission founded in 1797. Fremont has been multicultural since its inception. Today's visitor is likely to hear half a dozen languages spoken even during a fleeting trip to the city.

Fremont is bordered by Milpitas to the south and Union City to the north, and it entirely surrounds the small city of Newark.

Get around

By car
This is the preferred method. Fremont streets are usually easy to navigate. Difficult intersections were re-engineered for efficiency decades ago. Motorists will find travel to be very slow during commute hours in the unfavorable direction.

By bike
Bike lanes are present on many major roads in Fremont. For maximum safety, avoid the large roads that lead to the freeway since they are the most congested, and your bike isn't going to go on the freeway anyway, is it?

By bus
The AC Transit bus system serves Fremont poorly. Bus schedules are designed for the daily commuter, not the casual traveler. In the middle of the day, buses may run as infrequently as once per hour, so be sure you have an up-to-date bus schedule and know when your bus is coming.

Attractions

 • Mission San Jose, 43300 Mission Blvd., Daily 10AM-5PM. Spanish mission founded in 1797. The original mission church buildings are long gone, but the current rebuilt mission is nice with a good museum.
 • Don Edwards National Wildlife Refuge, (Take SR84 west toward the Dumbarton Bridge. Go south at the Thornton Exit. After a quarter mile, turn right onto Marshlands Rd. At the stop sign, turn left into the refuge parking lot), 510-792-0222 - The baylands around the south end of the San Francisco Bay have been turned into a Wildlife Refuge. The museum at the headquarters in Fremont is worth seeing.
 • Ardenwood Historic Farm, 34600 Ardenwood Blvd. - Tue-Sun 10AM to 4PM, A working farm founded in 19th century. Organic produce available. Old buildings. Demonstrations of 19th century trades.
 • Central Park, 40000 Paseo Padre Parkway - Huge park with lake. Great for a picnic, kite-flying or exercise. Boat rentals available.
 • NUMMI Tour - Visit a high-tech auto assembly plant and see giant welding and stamping machines. By reservation only, but free.
 • Sunol Water Temple, just east of Fremont proper on SR84, the Niles Canyon Road - All tourists will want to see some of California's infamous waterworks and the surprisingly attractive Water Temple is the closest exemplar. Open 9-3, Monday through Friday.
 • Niles Film Museum, 37395 Niles Boulevard, (510) 494-1411 - Silent Films, some produced locally. Showings are Friday and Saturday nights for a small fee, and fine homemade snacks are served.
 • Naz Cinema, 39160 Paseo Padre Parkway, (510) 797-2000 - Shows Bollywood Films' produced on the other side of the globe, most with English subtitles. The concession offers good-quality snacks like pakoras and samosas.

Activities

 • Bike The Alameda Creek Trail is a great place to go for a ride. Start at the east end where the creek comes out of the hills on Old Canyon Road. The paved trail runs 12 miles to the San Francisco Bay, and there isn't a single motor vehicle on the whole trail. About two miles from the bay, you can optionally go to Coyote Hills for a good view. From there, you can proceed south to the Don Edwards Wildlife refuge, and then west to the bike lane over the Dumbarton Bridge. Starting from the easternmost point on the trail (at the Niles Staging Area on Old Canyon Road) means that you will generally go downwind last when you are most tired.
 • Hike At Coyote Hills Regional Park . Isolated small hill near the bay with a great view of San Francisco on a clear day. Mission Peak is a great place to hike where you get a very nice view of the Bay Area. On top you can see throughout into Livermore and beyond as well.
 • Broadway West, 4000-B Bay Street, (510) 683-9218. A stage company that performs five plays every year in a very intimate setting. Expect well-performed, offbeat plays. They also hold dinner mystery theatres, and plays by local writers.
 • Ride The Niles Canyon Railway offers scenic one-hour steam locomotive excursions through the very canyon where Charlie Chaplin's "The Tramp" was filmed. A donation of $5-10 is suggested.
 • Skate The Sharks Ice Arena is a pleasant place to ice-skate that has public hours nearly every day. Central Park is a fine place for roller-skating.

Dining

Many restaurants cater to Fremont's large immigrant community. Chinese, Indian, and Afghani food are very common.
 • Chinese Buffet, 5035 Mowry Avenue, (510) 818-1908. Don't let the generic name stop you from coming in; it's quite good for a Chinese Buffet. All you can eat crab, beef ribs, sushi, Mongolian barbecue, shrimp, duck, and other food. Expect a fifteen-minute wait to get in.
 • Copper Chimney, 5255 Mowry Ave., (510) 505-9003. A spicy Indian restaurant with nice decor.
 • Elephant Bar Restaurant, 39233 Fremont Blvd., (510) 742-6221. A better than average chain restaurant, at about the usual price for a slightly upscale restaurant. Kids meals are cheap here.
 • Fu Lam Moon, 40460 Albrae St near Stevenson, (510) 668-1333. A fine place for dim sum on weekends from about 10-2. Not recommended for regular meals.
 • Habibi Restaurant, Irvington Shopping Plaza, 3906 Washington Blvd. - "The Flavor of Lebanon." A small and noisy neighborhood place with tasty food.
 • King Noodle House, 39226 Argonaut Way, (510) 795-2888. Cheap, fast and filling Asian cuisine.
 • Salang Pass, 37462 Fremont Blvd., (510) 795-9200. An upscale, superb Afghani restaurant with superb kabobs and beautiful decor. Possibly the best Afghani food in the Bay Area. If you're looking for something cheaper, "De Kabob House", across the street, is excellent and has lots of character, but tiny and slow. Just look for the long line of hungry people standing outside a door. No alcohol is served.
 • Yuki Japanese Restaurant, 1932 Driscoll Rd. near Paseo Padre Parkway, (510) 656-5021. Outstanding sushi and traditional Japanese dishes prepared with flare. Quite possibly Fremont's finest restaurant. Be prepared to wait during peak hours.
 • The Country Way, (Put address here) (Put phone number here), this restaurant is of notoriety for Fremont residents. Ask anybody and they will tell you that this place has the best, most filling meals. Especially for breakfast.

If you want a fancy restaurant, consider crossing the Dumbarton Bridge to Palo Alto.

Lodging

 • Lord Bradley's Inn, 43344 Mission Boulevard, (510) 490-0520 or (877) 567-3272, Fax: (510) 490-3015.
 • Best Western Garden Court, 5400 Mowry Avenue, (510) 792-4300, Fax: (510) 792-2643
 • Courtyard Fremont Silicon Valley, 47000 Lakeview Boulevard, (510) 656-1800, Fax: (510) 656-2441
 • Fremont Marriott, 46100 Landing Parkway, (510) 413-3700, Fax: (510) 413-3710
 • Hampton Inn, 6500 Landing Parkway, (510) 498-1900
 • Hawthorne Suites, 42200 Albrae St., (510) 651-7373, Fax: (510) 651-7362
 • Holiday Inn Express, 47031 Kato Rd, (510) 490-2900
 • La Quinta Inn and Suites, 46200 Landing Parkway, (510) 445-0808 - Good free breakfast, free high-speed internet in some rooms, but call the local number to maker sure you are really getting one of the right rooms--don't rely on the description when booking on the web.
 • Motel 6 Fremont North, 34047 Fremont Boulevard, (510) 793-4848, Fax: (510) 791-8170 - This chain is a great cheap place to stay when you're out in the middle of nowhere on a highway. And usually terrible in major cities. Fremont resembles the latter.
 • Motel 6 Fremont South, 46101 Research Avenue, (510) 490-4528, Fax: (510) 490-5937
 • Residence Inn Fremont Silicon Valley, 5400 Farwell Place, (510) 794-5900, Fax: (510) 793-6587
 • Silicon Valley/Fremont AmeriSuites, 3101 West Warren Ave, (510) 623-6000, Fax: (510) 623-6001 -

Get out

Simple day trips from Fremont include:
 • San Francisco via BART
 • The Oakland Museum in Oakland, a few blocks away from the Oakland BART station.
 • Sacramento via Amtrak's Capitol Corridor train
 • Monterey by car. Amtrak can get you there inefficiently.

When leaving, some good next destinations to choose include:
 • Yosemite or the Sierra Nevada in general.
 • Los Angeles
 • The Shasta Cascades region is on the way to Portland and Seattle, and includes several volcanic parks.