A Visit to California by Eastern Horticulturalists - 1870

"Brief Notes"? Are there long notes?

The summer after the Transcontinental Railroad reached the San Francisco Bay, these esteemed horticulturalists (and ladies) visited California: Marshal P. Wilder, Charles Downing, George Ellwanger and Patrick Barry.

The May 6, 1869 ceremony in Promontory, Utah celebrated the joining of East to West, ending in Sacramento. But travelers had to travel the rest of the way to San Francisco by boat from Sacramento.

Less celebrated was the first through train on the Western Pacific Road to the San Francisco Bay on September 6, 1869. The first train arrive in Alameda on that day and then two months later to Oakland. Niles station was not even a year old yet in June 1870.

These famous horticulturalists made the trip during the next growing season. They arrived on June 20 in San Francisco. Did they take the ferry from Sacramento? Or the train to Alameda then a ferry to SF?

They travelled all over the Bay Area visiting nurseries and orchards. They visited the counties of the San Francisco Bay (San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Alameda, Contra Costa, Napa, and Sonoma). They visited Sacramento and the Big Trees.