San Francisco - June to September

daveyjoe

Just booked flights to San Francisco from the end of June to the beginning of September.

There are four of us heading over in total. Four lads (all 21). We decided to go for this pretty much on a whim and we have nothing planned (but plenty of time to get things organised). We've decided not to J1 so we will all have plenty of free time.

A few questions:

• Would it be possible for us to rent and drive an RV Only one of us has a full driving licence and that isn't likely to change before we get over there.
• I have put aside a budget of €4,000 (already spent €670 on flights), is that a bit optimistic, I could squeeze in another €1,000 if needed
• Any accommodation advice for the four of us? Anybody know about staying on campus or anything like that?

Any general advice would be appreciated too.

df1985

did a j1 last year in Boston.

one of my group rented a car no problem, she was 21 with a full licence.loads of people had said the big rental companies wouldnt rent a car to anyone under 25 so we went to a small local one where they made us pay a little extra, you should be able to get one somewhere.

i didnt work out there even though i payed for a j1! too many irish j1ers, so all jobs were gone in about a week.thankfully i had plenty of savings which i lived off. 4000 euros in dollars is about 6000 dollars at todays rates.thats loads!! id say i spent about 4000-4500 DOLLARS and we really lived it up for that much.that didnt include flights though.

my rent was 280 a month.that was 7 of us in a huge 3 bed apartment in a good area paying that each, plus we had to put a months deposit down.we payed for june and august at the start so that was over 800 dollars gone straight away.budget for the possibilty that you might have to pay a lot of rent upfront.

living expenses-you can really live cheaply over there.30 cans of cheap beer (natural ice) was 12 dollars! 2 litres of smirnoff vodka was 15 dollars.its as cheap to eat out as it is to eat in.we didnt cook ONCE! our main expense was nights out.the big clubs were up to 10 dollars a drink, and 20 dollars in.we found some mental irish bars where it was about 4 dollars a beer, 6 dollars for spirits(huge measures) we were in them 3/4 nights a week and would go to house parties other nights.so with the amount your talkin about bringin you'll really be able to live it up if you want to.

other than that we spent money on travelling around a good bit,went to concerts, went to theme parks, went away for 2/3 nights in other cities NYC etc and bought a ridiculous amount of clothes, a whole new suitcase full!!
also went to san diego and LA for 2 weeks at the end.stayed a night in mexico for a night too.
4000 euros is plenty in my opinion and you could do it for way cheaper if you wanted.really depends whether you want to live it up or do it on the cheap.

this of course is all from a boston point of view so san fran could be different.i think rent in california is a bit higher-certainly is in san diego anyway.
if you get stuck just work illegally for a few weeks, we knew loads that had no j1 and stilled worked.

as for stayin on campus, had friends that stayed in the frat house on MIT campus.check the local colleges website id say.they paid crazy money to stay there and the place had mice,roaches and was filthy.yes they did have savage parties etc but they regretted stayin there overall.pot luck though, some of the frat house were palaces.

any more questions fire ahead.

daveyjoe

Wow, excellent reply df1985, very helpful!

Have a couple more questions, don't have time to ask them now, I'll reply later.

Heisenberg.

This post has been deleted.

daveyjoe

Thanks for that

The Scientist wrote: »

1. Of course, if he has the full Licence then drive on.

I guess I was wondering if an RV is treated differently to a normal car.

The Scientist wrote: »

I stayed just off the San Francisco State Uni campus in the stonestown

Do you mind me asking what kind of rent you were paying?

Thanks again!

daveyjoe

What's the best way to deal with money over in the states. Will I be able to use my ATM/Maestro card? Are travellers cheques the best way to go?

df1985

i just used my atm card, take out large amounts at a time though because you're charged each time you use them.

the square

thinking of going to san fran with a few mates. we are all 20. will it be hard to get served??
And how hot is san fran in the summer? I was lead to believe that its mild enough with its famous "summer fog". I hope thats not the case, as i think everyone wants a tan (without sounding vain or nething)!!
thanks in advance:D:D

daveyjoe

the square wrote: »

thinking of going to san fran with a few mates. we are all 20. will it be hard to get served??
And how hot is san fran in the summer? I was lead to believe that its mild enough with its famous "summer fog". I hope thats not the case, as i think everyone wants a tan (without sounding vain or nething)!!
thanks in advance:D:D

From what I hear mosy places ask for ID from everyone. My dad was asked for ID a couple of times when I'd was over there a few years ago, he's 51 and he looks it too.

Weather is pretty mild, I suppose the average summer day would be about 18-19 degrees. It rarely rains though and there will be plenty of sun there to get ye all tanned.

sezconz

There's about 5/6 of us goin2 San Francisco for a month(well starting in San Fran..hopefully travelling to LA, Las vegas, San Diego and everywhere inbetween) We're all 19/20...so ID is gonna be a problem, anyone know where to get a good fake irish driver's license or if we'd even get away with them?

Also if the BART(San fran's version of the DART) is dangerous at night as 2 of us are gonna have to travel from oakland airport to san fran about 11/12ish??

Any advice at all would be great..even about that san fran to san diego route it general:)

daveyjoe

sezconz wrote: »

ID is gonna be a problem, anyone know where to get a good fake irish driver's license or if we'd even get away with them?

I really don't know. You may be ok in some places but other places may have never seen one before and say no. Don't be tempted to get a fake passport though, they're fairly easily to get hold of but I can imagine that U.S. customs would be inspecting your cavities if they found one in your luggage.

Neamhshuntasach

Friends who live in San Diego told me that a new state law was passed last year where the only ID acceptable is ones that have eye color, height and weight on them. Such as American driver's licenses and their college ID's. I was over there just before Christmas and i couldn't get served in supermarkets with my passport and i'm 24. But the bars accepted it with much scrutinizing and asking for secondary ID such as a visa card. So carry some other ID if it is indeed a new state law.

It can be expensive enough to rent an RV. We done when going on a road trip to colorado and it was 150 bucks a day with 100 miles free i think. As far as i remember it cost me 300 base price for the 10 days and then whatever else for petrol and having to pay to park somewhere at times. Cops will tell you to move on if you are parked up in certain areas. There is also a 25 dollar charge per day if you are under 25. One of the fellas with us was 25 so we just put him down as the only driver even though we took turns.

4k euro is around 6100 dollars. the average daily spend for 2 months would be around 100 dollars a day. You can easily spend this depending what you are doing. And the fact you're not working it's always an invitation to spend more. But if you drink before heading out and don't eat out all the time you'll be fine with that amount of money.

Also regarding the fake irish drivers license question. Don't even bother. They don't accept real ones unless you are in a tiny little town or kip of a place and they don't care. Whenever friends visited me they couldn't get served with them as they look fake to the Americans as theirs is like a bank card.

Flynn

Hey I'm in San Fran at the mo so said i'd throw in my 2 cents...

As for the BART - there is lots of freaks/crack heads around everywhere - it's nuts, but most of the time they're so ****ed they won;t even know you're there.

The weather at the moment is like a really nice Irish day - cold in the morning and then shorts n T-shirt hot later on.. will get hotter for summer alrite you would get a tan... Ye could do side trips to Santa Cruz etc..

Anyway, any questions while im here lemme know..

arcade1

the bart doesn't run past 12, so you better hope your plane isn't delayed. but even before that it not dangerious atall, the city feels far safer that dublin or london.
no ID will be a problem, they ask everywhere, almost no place will accecpt an irish drivers lience, especially irish pubs won't.
the fog normally burns off by 9 or ten in the morning and comes back late at night and the days are nice but not as hot as it gets outsite the city.