Menlo Park is a peaceful, tree-lined city of roughly 34,000 residents, with desirable neighborhoods, great schools, and high quality of life. With its beautiful and welcoming downtown, it is a desireable shopping and dining destination for residents and visitors alike. Menlo park is proud of its trees and green spaces and hosts a popular weekly farmer market.

Menlo Park is a hub of education and innovation, adjacent to Stanford University it is also the city where Google was founded and is the current headquarters of Facebook.

Menlo Park stretches from the bay all the way to the Santa Cruz Mountain foothills, and like other Peninsula communities it has great year round weather and is in convenient reach of the big city energy of San Francisco while maintaining easy access to the relaxing open spaces, forests and coastal areas.

History

Originally inhabited by the Ohlone people when Spanish explorers arrived in 1769, the area became part of the Spanish Mexican government’s masive Rancho de las Pulgas land grant. In 1851 two Irish immigrants purchased a 1,700 acre tract of land, and erected a gate with a wooden arch with the inscription “Menlo Park”, in honor of their former home in County Galway, Ireland. In 1863 Menlo Park became a train stop between San Francisco and San Jose, which brought growth to the area. Along with the neighboring city of Atherton, which wanted to maintain a strictly residential community, Menlo Park was incorporated in 1922 with the intention to become a more commercially friendly city. 

Things to Do

• Parks: True to its name, Menlo Park is full of so many beautiful parks to choose from. With playgrounds, sports facilities, walking trails, picnic areas there is something for everyone.
• Arts: The Cantor Center for Visual Arts, Rodin Sculpture Garden and Arizona Cacti Garden, along with the Anderson Collection at Standford Univesity, offer a wide variety of traditional and modern artistic experiences.
• Dining: Downtown Menlo Park is full of both charming and high end restuarants, bars and coffee shops. And if you want some variety, you are in the middle of everything the Peninsula has to offer, with convenient access to Palo Alto and more urban areas like San Francisco.