In December of 2023, I took a trip to California to meet a girl I had been talking to after winning the “World’s Ultimate Apple Superfan” contest. We both shared a love for Apple and decided a trip to Cupertino would be a perfect first date!
We started the trip by spending a couple days in Los Angeles. We stayed in a hotel right off the Santa Monica Pier and caught a show at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood. We also had to check out a couple of the Apple Stores in the area!
After our time in LA, we flew up to San Jose!
We stayed at the Hilton Garden Inn, a hotel we picked because it is right across the street from Apple Park. I made sure to pick a room with a view of the spaceship! I opted to pay for breakfast in advance when making the reservation online, which is apparently something Apple does for their guests, because the staff assumed I had a meeting with Apple when they saw my breakfast was already paid for!
Our first stop after getting checked in to the hotel was Infinite Loop. We didn’t realize it at the time, but our timing couldn’t have been better as the retail store located at that campus was closed a month later. We made sure to pick up some of the Apple swag only available at that location! We got some Apple-branded pens, notebooks, and shirts.
We also realized Intel had a museum in the area, so we went to check that out!
For dinner we went to the famous Buck’s of Woodside where they had some cool Apple memorabilia on display including a platinum record and an Apple I signed by Woz!
The next day we took a walk around Apple Park. You can’t see very much of the campus just walking around the perimeter, but every once in a while there are some great views. Plus there are strawberry trees lining the way with fresh fruits to snack on! We stopped at the visitor center to pick up some more exclusive merch. I got more shirts and a deck of cards. We also got coffee at Caffè Macs, played with the Apple Park AR Experience, and walked through the Mirage Sculpture.
Next we made a stop by Steve Jobs’ parents’ house, where Apple was founded and the first computers were made. I was surprised to learn that, despite carrying a local historical designation, it is still used as a private residence – complete with tons of security cameras and “No Trespassing” signs.
We finished off our trip with a walk around downtown Palo Alto to see one more Apple store.
It was an incredible trip and I’m so happy I had someone to share it with! I never could have imagined that entering a silly Apple fan contest would result in me being able to check an item off my bucket list!
