South San Jose. California

Though culturally vibrant, San Jose has always been shadowed by San Francisco. Originally founded as El Pueblo de San Jose de Guadalupe, the city is California’s oldest Spanish settlement. Its downtown is small for a city of its size, though it does teem with clubgoers in their 20s on weekends. Corporate parks, high-tech companies and housing developments are sprawled across the landscape, taking the places where farms and ranches once were between the bay and the surrounding hills.