Vallejo

Understand

The name "Vallejo" is locally pronounced in a confused hybrid of Spanish and English as "vuh LAY hoe." In Spanish this ought to be "bah YAY hoe," and you may find some locals who speak Spanish as their first language pronouncing the city's name this way.

The northern suburb of Vallejo is American Canyon, which is across the county line in Napa County but otherwise similar.

Local information

• Vallejo City city website

Get in

By car

Vallejo has four major highways that lead into the city.

• Interstate 80 Westbound from Sacramento and Eastbound from San Francisco
• Interstate 780 Westbound from Benicia and the East Bay
• State Route 29 (Sonoma Blvd.) Southbound from the Napa Valley
• State Route 37 (Marine World Pkwy.) Eastbound from Marin and Sonoma

By ferry

San Francisco Bay Ferry (+1 707-64-FERRY) provides an hourly ferry services from San Francisco's Financial District with a crossing time of just over one hour. Vallejo Ferry Terminal is at 289 Mare Island Way, near the intersection with Georgia St.

By bus

Get around

By car

Similar to San Francisco, most of Vallejo uses a grid-like network of roads with about every three blocks north–south being a major road that crosses town. It's best to also ask for a cross street when looking for directions. Most roads in this area are named by US states going east/west and California counties going north–south. On Mare Island, the grid is based on numbered and lettered streets. There are also numbered streets on the mainland, but they are in broken order and have other named roads in between them. Other roads (mostly in the east) are usually rural roads or roads that are located in the hills, and can't hold to the grid.

Enterprise, Hertz and Avis all have car rental locations in Vallejo.

Public transportation

Isolated areas

There are two parts of Vallejo that are isolated from the main part of town: Mare Island and Hiddenbrooke. Neither of them provide bus service.

• Mare Island is a former U.S. Navy base, consisting of a mix of historic military housing and industrial buildings.
• Hiddenbrooke can only be accessed legally through Hiddenbrooke Parkway, via. I-80 (between Vallejo and Fairfield). Bikes and pedestrians use the Solano Bikeway between Columbus and Hiddenbrooke Parkways.

Stay safe

The safest areas of Vallejo are usually places that are isolated from the main part of the city, such as Mare Island and Hiddenbrooke. Most of the major shopping centers in Vallejo as well as most of Vallejo east of I-80 and the hills around the west of it are safe enough to travel, but are not completely crime free. However, Vallejo has a reputation for its areas of violent crime. Most of these areas are located in patches west of I-80, where some are labelled locally such as The Crest in the North, and Millersville in Central Vallejo; there is also one in South Vallejo along Magazine Street. Sonoma Blvd. (SR 29) between Nebraska and Georgia Streets is a main location for human trafficking. It is unlikely most of these areas will be of any interest to tourists, but if you plan to be in these areas, be vigilant and use your street smarts.

Go next

Sacramento- 80 East. About 1 hour away with no traffic.

San Francisco- 80 West. About 40 to 70 minutes away, depending on traffic.

Napa Valley- 29 North. About 10 to 50 minutes away, depending on where you are going in the Valley.

Santa Rosa- 37 West to 101 North. About 40 to 60 minutes away, depending on traffic.