The history of America is one of relentless Westward expansion from the original small East coast settlements. But eventually that had to stop: the zealots and misfits that had kept on running as conformity pursued them across the continent washed up on the West coast and built..... California.

The climate of Northern and Central California is, without a doubt, the most desirable of any locale I have had the fortune to visit.

It is dry, warm and sunny. Many places are dry, warm and sunny for parts of the year. California is dry, warm and sunny predictably and constantly. It does rain, but it's a nice, gentle, warm rain, then the clouds clear and it's.... dry, warm and sunny. It doesn't get baking hot either: about 78°F.

Of course as a result everybody wants to live in California, hence the house prices are stupid, and no one can afford to live anywhere near where they work. So 3 or 4 hour commutes each way are not uncommon.

The traffic is, of course, crazy. California is internationally renowned for it's traffic, and it's amazing road systems. They are really cool to drive on, because the Americans allow, and even encourage, overtaking on both sides, so you can really belt down the inside lane then slide in to lane #4, say, to pass the trucks. In a decent car, that is i.e. not an American car.

It beats me how the country that invented the automobile in a meaningful sense (transport for the masses) can have got it so wrong. Weak performance, squealy tyres, dreadful automatics, appalling "Boulevard ride" suspensions, zero road-holding, badly cambered roads, moronic speed limits, unsynchronised traffic lights, over-tight and corkscrewing motorway junctions and over-sized concrete expansion joints make what should be the world's most pleasurable driving experience in to a stop-start slow mess. The Americans really should take a leaf out of Germany's book.

You can keep Southern California: too hot, too false, too much. The English don't like excess and false things.
But Northern California; anywhere from San Francisco northwards, is heavenly.

The people are genuinely friendly and have one foot in the earth, so to speak, like many English country folk (perhaps having a Naturalised local but English and very good old friend libing there helps). They prefer physical outdoor pursuits to sterile indoor pursuits, so as a result you see fewer grotesquely fat people in Northern California than you see elsewhere.

Hiking, cycling, running, walking, swimming, boating, fishing, hang-gliding, bungee-jumping and rockk-climbing are all commonplace and they all seem to be doing at least one of them. And the Chinese ethnic input seems to have helped: all along the Pacific North West sushi is commonplace, and cheap. In the UK "cheap" and "sushi" can seemingly never be uttered in the same sentence.