Visit California's oldest redwood state park & Silicon Valley

Visit California's oldest redwood state park & Silicon Valley

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Discover California’s oldest redwood state park, combined with a trip to Silicon Valley or the Pacific Highway natural wonders, beach towns and Santa Cruz world class attractions

The perfect Redwood getaway outdoor adventure– A Must-Do

Trip Overview: Discover the biggest, the best, oldest, and largest redwoods in the entire San Francisco Bay Area on this day trip to the South Bay of San Francisco. Combine your private day trip to the majestic redwoods with additional sights, hidden gems, and thrilling outdoor adventures of your choice. This is a bucket-list worry-free tour package and highly recommended for everyone, including families with kids.

Join us now to explore California’s oldest redwood state park combined with a private custom tour of Silicon Valley or with thrilling outdoor adventures including, but not limited to, a Redwood Canopy zipline thrilling adventure to experience the giant redwoods from above.

You may also combine this new exciting adventure with a side trip to the Pacific Coast Highway 1 to marvel at the natural wonders, stunning state beaches, and beach towns including Pacifica, Half-Moon Bay, Davenport, Santa Cruz. Or travel to Santa Cruz Mystery Spot to experience a strange natural phenomenon, that will defy your perception of the laws of physics and gravity! You may also combine this new redwood day trip with a ride into the past on a stunning 19th Century steam train, by traveling through towering redwood groves and up on a winding narrow-gauge track all the way to the summit of Bear Mountain.

Looking to immerse yourself in the hidden nature in the Santa Cruz wilderness to restore balance and enjoy peace and tranquility? We can take you to a different forest of massive redwoods equally impressive and majestic like Big Basin State Park, at no extra charge, entrance fees included. Unlike Muir Woods, where tour guides are not allowed to guide their customers inside the park, your private tour guide will be walking and guiding you inside and outside this forest.

You may also add more attractions of your choice, such as taking a horseback ride on the beach or in the forest, visit Bigfoot discovery museum, head west to the Santa Cruz beach boardwalk to enjoy warm sand, cool surf, hot rides and free entertainment at the only major seaside amusement park on the West Coast.

Take a stroll through historic villages located off-the-beaten-path and enjoy your lunch at one of the local restaurants or let your private tour guide take you to one of Santa Cruz’s best state beaches to enjoy lunch and majestic of views of the Pacific Ocean coastline. You may even get lucky and spot whales, sharks, seals or elephant seals.

Do yourself a favor and skip the large crowds and big bus tours of Muir Woods. Did you know that Muir Woods has become the first national park to require all year-round reservation to it, without which you get turned away at the entrance wasting your day trip! Save yourself time and money and join us on this new relaxing discovery adventure to marvel at towering old redwoods without driving far and enjoy more peace and quality time in the real wilderness of Santa Cruz mountains.

Book this new and exclusive outdoor adventure online, or let us know more about your specific needs, and expectations, and will make your journey, unique, memorable and enjoyable.

Top recommendation: If you are not looking to add any of the extra adventures or optional attractions to this day tour, we highly recommend that you simply book this tour online at your earliest, to save time and money. Leave it to your expert local tour guide to customize the trip itinerary based on your preference and needs.

What’s Included?
All applicable taxes, pickup and drop off at your hotel in San Francisco or even in the south bay area(the length of the tour will be adjusted accordingly) , a private 8-hour guided tour, all applicable taxes, your redwoods forest entrance fees(some of the oldest and largest redwoods in California) ,commercial parking and permits fees, state park or beaches entrance fees. This 8-hour tour is totally private and customizable to your needs and schedule.

What’s Not Included?
Meals, driver’s gratuity (which are recommended and customary in the USA at 15%-20%) and entrance tickets or fees to any optional site/place not stated above.

Tips for visitors and policy:
You can either combine this new adventure with a trip to Silicon Valley or via California Coast Highway 1 and beach towns like Half-Moon Bay and Santa Cruz. This itinerary is ideal for nature lovers and photographers unless you want us to drive you through Silicon Valley. However, we cannot do both. No prior planning is required, please leave it to your tour guide, he or she will customize the trip on the go.
The itinerary may change based on your time, roads closure or weather conditions. When it is rainy or foggy, we may have to skip some areas or places for safety considerations or due to the lack of visibility or road closure.
Smoking is not allowed in our vehicles. We are sorry, but our vehicles are not pet friendly and not equipped for passengers with disability or wheelchairs. Thank you for understanding.
Our tours are conducted in English unless otherwise indicated on your tour voucher. Some foreign languages are subject to additional fees to cover the required extra wages of this freelancer or bilingual tour guide’s additional fees (who we may hire to carry out your guided tour, and in your own language).
Wheelchair and handicap accessibility issues: We apologize but our vehicles are not equipped with wheelchair access. There is no room for a wheelchair in our vehicles unless it’s a very small and foldable wheelchair. However, the main concern is the customers’ ability to get it in and out of the vehicles for liability issues. If you have mobility issues, please consider booking one of our other redwood tours that takes you through a redwood forest without even stepping out of the vehicle (like Armstrong Redwoods or Point Reyes combined with Samuel Taylor Redwoods).
Clothing: Please be prepared for cold and warm weather in the same day, fog and breeze, slippery roads and hiking trails, so please have comfortable hiking shoes.
-Don’t waste your time shopping around, we have more options, top-rated custom tours and exclusive outdoor adventures, than any other tour company in the Bay Area and Northern California. Our solid reputation of 20 years in business with 100% satisfaction speaks for itself. Book more tours and save Big! At Golden Horizon Travel we aim to exceed your expectations with every tour, and with our discounts we'll save you money, too! Book 4 or 5 full-day tours and save up to 10 % off.
The misconception about private tours: There a misconception about private tours. Yes, public large bus group tours are more cost-effective for the operator, than private tours. In essence, the input cost of private tours and public tours are roughly the same - both provide one driver or a tour guide, one vehicle, same trip length whilst both companies assume the same business expenses and commercial insurance liability. However, private tour operators (like ours) make 90% less profit than public group tours, because all our resources are dedicated to a small group (couples or families), whilst the pubic tour operators make 10 times more profits thanks to the volume(quantity)! We, on the other hand, focus on quality as we never share our private tours with other customers. Yet, although we provide a higher quality tour service, and incur even greater expenses in many cases, the profit margins are limited. This makes some of our private tours barely profitable due to the increasing cost and liability of conducting business in California.
This detailed trip itinerary covers sights and attractions that require more than one day to see and explore, our goal is to select the top sights based on factors like your preference, road and sites road closures which happens quite often, for that, we do not guarantee access to any place closed to vehicles and to the public. We offer a full day private 8-hour custom tour, and you can enjoy it your way and at your pace, some clients don’t even see 50% of these sights as they prefer spending more time in few places than running all day to cover as many places as possible. Also, we do skip all places and sites that are subject to bad weather conditions, fog and wind.
Tips for visitors who want to visit Silicon Valley
-Many sites, firms and museums are closed on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, during the Holidays and weekends, this vary from place to place. Most of museums and sites have admission fees that are not included in your tour price. We are extremely transparent, so we are not to blame for any misunderstanding regarding our Silicon Valley tour, terms and policy as stated on this website. We highly recommend that you check out these places and firms before you book your tour, so we are not to blame. Check out these private museums, firms and their websites to learn more about their schedules, closures and hours of operations.
Here are the most famous sites and their websites:
-Intel Museum: (daily open 9 AM–6 PM but closed on Sunday, during the holidays (and may close at any time without a prior notice as this a private firm).
-The Computer History Museum: Closed on Mondays and Tuesdays and for private events without a prior notice. Otherwise, it opens from 10 to 5 pm Wednesday to Sunday (but may close at any time without a prior notice as it’s a private museum).
-Stanford Campus Walking Tour https://visit.stanford.edu/tours/ offers a 70 minutes approximately free walking tour at 10:45 am and at 3 pm upon availability (first-come, first-served basis). Closed during the holidays, inaugurations and for private events. Sometimes, they may not have enough volunteers to carry out this free tour and may cancel it at any time and without a prior notice. (may close to the public at any time without a prior notice as it’s a private university). -NASA Ames Research Center: https://www.nasa.gov/centers/ames/home/exploration.html Hours: Tuesday - Friday 10 a.m. - 4 p.m. and Saturday - Sunday noon - 4 p.m. Closed Mondays and federal holidays and for private events. Children's Discovery Museum of San Jose: https://www.cdm.org/please check their schedule as it changes constantly
-The Tech Museum of Innovation: https://www.thetech.org/ please check their schedule as it changes constantly Hiller Aviation Museum: https://www.hiller.org/ please check their schedule as it changes constantly
***Its customers’ responsibility to check all these sites and other firms before booking this Silicon Valley tour.
-Please understand that many sites, firms, parks like Stanford, do not allow tour guides to carry out guided tours inside their campus or perimeters. In addition, parking in places like Stanford is a major issue regardless the size of the vehicle you book, please exchange your telephone numbers with your driver so he or she meets you back at a specific place or landmark after your self-guided walking tour (on your own). All vehicles more than 7 seats require extra $400 parking fees and reservation in advance to access at Stanford (and that would be at the charge of customers). If book the SUV tour, then the parking and permit fees are at our charge.
-This tour lasts 8 hours’ door to door service when we start and end the tour in San Francisco. We are located in San Francisco, not in Silicon Valley. But when our Silicon Valley tour starts, and or ends in Silicon Valley Area or South Bay Area (instead of San Francisco), the tour will last 5 to 6 hours’ maximum as it takes us 90 minutes’ drive each way to drive from San Francisco to Silicon Valley, and vice versa for the driver to get back to San Francisco where we are based. We do recommend adding overtime at a discounted rate, so you can enjoy quality time and add more stops along the way.
***Its customers’ responsibility to check all these sites and other firm’s hours of operations and closures before booking this Silicon Valley tour - We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone.
Note: The question we get a lot from customers and travelers are whether they can go inside tech giant’s facilities or not. Yes, it’s true that the most notable Silicon Valley tech giants offer no tours of their campuses or access to the public inside their facilities. However, some allow limited public access inside their premises, whilst others like Google, Oracle, Apple and Facebook, don’t. They are secretive, and they have the right to be protective in this new era of cyber-attacks and security issues. The only way a member of the public can tour the inside of campus buildings is if they are escorted by an employee. So, if you happen to have a friend or relative who works there, ask them to get an invitation, and we will get you there.
What all visitor should know is that even if you are invited by a famous Silicon Valley firm like Google, they never allow anyone to go upstairs to visit their offices. All visitors remain limited to the lobby area downstairs or in the food court area, which offers no benefits, only a lot of hassle and nothing much to see. Our tour guides’ tip of the day. Our tour guides recommend that you take full advantage of your one-time trip to Silicon Valley and rather focus on what you can see and get insider access to places that make the most of your day.