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Stanford University sports, which boast more national team championships than any other NCAA Division I school—partly because it sponsors 42 varsity sports, the largest number of teams of any NCAA Division I member outside of the Ivy League. Most sports compete in the Atlantic Coast Conference (despite the geographic oddity), which Stanford joined in 2024 after the collapse of its former home of the Pac-12 Conference. That said, the most nationally prominent sports are football and basketball (men's and women's), though the vast majority of its titles have come in non-revenue sports. The most notable venues are the football home of Stanford Stadium and Maples Pavilion, home to basketball and volleyball.
The Stanford Cardinal are the athletic teams that represent Stanford University. Stanford's teams compete at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I level, primarily in the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC).
The 1,940-acre Baylands Preserve brings you to the edge of San Francisco Bay and is a component of the critical wetlands needed to preserve wildlife and marine life in the San Francisco region; it is a great place to hike, bike, watch birds and enjoy an afternoon. The Lucy Evans Baylands Nature Interpretive Center has interesting educational programs for children and adults. Take Embarcadero Road east to the very end to get there.
This restored garage is a museum, California Registered and National Historic Landmark -- the site where Hewlett-Packard was founded and the "Birthplace of Silicon Valley." You can only see this from the street.
A nationally recognized visual arts center that offers a variety of exhibitions, classes, workshops and art education programs. Exhibitions include the best of contemporary fine art, craft, design and new art forms, with a particular emphasis on the art of the San Francisco Bay Area.
Fans of the classic cult film, Harold and Maude should head to St. Thomas Aquinas Church, the oldest church in Palo Alto (built in 1902). Intimate and beautiful, with ornate wood ceiling crossbeams and gorgeous stained-glass panels, the sanctuary is the perfect place to step out of the modern world and take a moment for peaceful solitude and reflection.
The other birthplace of Silicon Valley. The first transistors were made here. It was later an international grocery store, but is now vacant. William Shockley was a brilliant researcher, but a lousy manager. His team - which included Gordon Moore and Robert Noyce (co-founders of Intel), Eugene Kleiner (founder of Kleiner-Perkins), Jean Hoerni (founder Union Carbide Electronics), Sheldon Roberts, and others - left to start Fairchild Semiconductors, which led to Intel and many other companies. It was the silicon transistor that created Silicon Valley.
A prestigious university that is sometimes nicknamed the "Harvard of the West". Offers cultural, athletic, natural and educational resources to Palo Alto visitors. For example, Outdoor Sculpture at Stanford University includes a very large collection of large scale works by Rodin in a garden immediately adjoining the Museum of Art, which is also home to a large collection of Rodin sculptures including one of his most famous works, Le Penseur (The Thinker). Look for Andy Goldsworthy's River of Stone a few steps from the museum's front entry. A guided outdoor sculpture tour is conducted the first Sunday of each month at 2PM, rain or shine. The tour lasts about 1½ hours, and begins at the entrance of the Main Quad (where The Oval meets Serra Street). The New Guinea Sculpture Garden, created by New Guinean tribes people, is a beautiful collection of wooden sculptures (next to Roble Dormitory, near the intersection of Lomita Drive and Santa Teresa Street).