San Mateo County, officially the County of San Mateo, is a county located in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 764,442. Redwood City is the county seat, the third-most populated city in the county after Daly City and San Mateo.
Brisbane is a small city in San Mateo County, California, located on the lower slopes of the San Bruno Mountain. The city is on the northeastern edge of San Mateo County, located immediately south of the San Francisco city limits on the San Francisco Bay. The population was 4,851 as of the 2020 census.
San Bruno Mountain is a fault-block horst in northern San Mateo County, California. Rising to a quarter-mile high peak directly out of San Francisco Bay, it also includes a smaller ridge in San Francisco. Viewed from downtown San Francisco, the mountain occupies the southern horizon. It is surrounded as well by the cities of Brisbane, Colma, Daly City, and South San Francisco, and has an important role in the history and life of these communities.
Visitacion Valley, colloquially referred to as Viz Valley, is a neighborhood located in the southeastern quadrant of San Francisco, California.
The Los Gatos Creek runs 24 miles (39 km) in California through Santa Clara Valley Water District's Guadalupe Watershed from the Santa Cruz Mountains northward through the Santa Clara Valley until its confluence with the Guadalupe River in downtown San Jose. The Guadalupe River then continues onward into San Francisco Bay.
San Mateo Creek is a perennial stream whose watershed includes Crystal Springs Reservoir, for which it is the only natural outlet after passing Crystal Springs Dam.
Pilarcitos Creek is a 13.5-mile-long (21.7 km) coastal stream in San Mateo County, California, United States, that rises on the western slopes of the Santa Cruz Mountains and descends through Pilarcitos Canyon to discharge into the Pacific Ocean Half Moon Bay State Beach.
San Juan Creek, also called the San Juan River, is a 29-mile (47 km) long stream in Orange and Riverside Counties, draining a watershed of 133.9 square miles (347 km2). Its mainstem begins in the southern Santa Ana Mountains in the Cleveland National Forest. It winds west and south through San Juan Canyon, and is joined by Arroyo Trabuco as it passes through San Juan Capistrano. It flows into the Pacific Ocean at Doheny State Beach. State Route 74, the Ortega Highway, crosses the Santa Ana Mountains via San Juan Canyon.
Rancho Cañada de Guadalupe la Visitación y Rodeo Viejo was a 6,416-acre (25.96 km2) Mexican land grant in present-day San Mateo County, California, and San Francisco County, California given in 1841 by Governor Juan Alvarado to Jacob P. Leese. The rancho included three valleys: Cañada de Guadalupe, La Visitacion, and Rodeo Viejo. Rancho contained most of the present-day San Bruno Mountain, the city of Brisbane, Guadalupe Valley, and Visitacion Valley.
San Mateo Creek is a stream in Southern California in the United States, whose watershed mostly straddles the border of Orange and San Diego Counties. It is about 22 miles (35 km) long, flowing in a generally southwesterly direction. Draining a broad valley bounded by the Santa Ana Mountains and Santa Margarita Mountains, San Mateo Creek is notable for being one of the last unchannelized streams in Southern California.
Rancho Cañada de Raymundo was a 12,545-acre (50.77 km2) Mexican land grant in present-day San Mateo County, California given August 4, 1840 to Raimundo, a native of Baja California, who was sent out by the padres of Mission Santa Clara to capture runaway Mission Indians in 1797. On the 1856 Rancho de las Pulgas and 1868 Easton maps, the valley of Laguna Creek was referred to as the Cañada de Raymundo. Laguna Creek was also alternatively known as Cañada Raimundo Creek. In 1841 Rancho Cañada de Raymundo was granted to John Coppinger by Governor Juan Alvarado for helping in the revolt led by Alvarado against the Mexican authorities in Monterey. The two and one half league long by three-quarter league wide grant consisted the eastern slopes and valleys in the present-day Woodside area. The grant began at Alambique Creek, the north border of Rancho Corte de Madera, and extended north to Rancho Feliz. Rancho Cañada de Raymundo was bounded on the east by Rancho de las Pulgas. The rancho contained Laguna Grande, then a natural lake that was the campsite of the Portolà expedition on November 5, 1769, and was bisected by Laguna Creek, which flowed from southeast to northwest through the lake on its way to San Mateo Creek.
Permanente Creek is a 13.3-mile-long (21.4 km) stream originating on Black Mountain in Santa Clara County, California, United States. Named by early Spanish explorers as Arroyo Permanente or Río Permanente because of its perennial flow, the creek descends the east flank of Black Mountain then courses north through Los Altos and Mountain View, discharging into southwest San Francisco Bay historically at the Mountain View Slough but now virtually entirely diverted via the Permanente Creek Diversion Channel to Stevens Creek and Whisman Slough in San Francisco Bay.
Hale Creek is a short stream originating in the foothills of Los Altos Hills, California in Santa Clara County, California, United States. Its source is in the Rancho San Antonio Open Space Preserve, west of Neary Quarry. The creek flows northeasterly 4.6 miles (7.4 km) through the cities of Los Altos Hills, Los Altos, and Mountain View before joining Permanente Creek.
Saratoga Creek is a north-northeast flowing creek in Santa Clara County, California.
Bear Creek, or Bear Gulch Creek, is a 6.6-mile-long (10.6 km) southeastward-flowing stream originating north of the summit of Sierra Morena in the Santa Cruz Mountains, near the community of Kings Mountain in San Mateo County, California, United States. It flows through the town of Woodside. Bear Creek and Corte Madera Creek join to become San Francisquito Creek in the Jasper Ridge Biological Preserve at Stanford University.
San Lorenzo Creek is a 10.7-mile-long (17.2 km) year-round natural stream flowing through Hayward, California and other neighboring unincorporated communities into San Francisco Bay at the Hayward Regional Shoreline.
Calabazas Creek is a 13.3-mile-long (21.4 km) northeast by northward-flowing stream originating on Table Mountain in Saratoga, California in Santa Clara County, California, United States. It courses through the cities of Saratoga, San Jose, Cupertino, Santa Clara and Sunnyvale, culminating in the Guadalupe Slough in south San Francisco Bay.
El Camino Viejo a Los Ángeles, also known as El Camino Viejo and the Old Los Angeles Trail, was the oldest north-south trail in the interior of Spanish colonial Las Californias (1769–1822) and Mexican Alta California (1822–1848), present day California. It became a well established inland route, and an alternative to the coastal El Camino Real trail used since the 1770s in the period.
Cantua Creek, formerly in Spanish Arroyo de Cantúa, was named for José de Guadalupe Cantúa, a prominent Californio Ranchero in the 19th-century Mexican era of Alta California.
Alamitos Creek or Los Alamitos Creek is a 7.7-mile-long (12.4 km) creek in San Jose, California, which becomes the Guadalupe River when it exits Lake Almaden and joins Guadalupe Creek. Los Alamitos Creek is located in Almaden Valley and originates from the Los Capitancillos Ridge in the Santa Cruz Mountains, near New Almaden. This creek flows through the Valley's Guadalupe Watershed, which is owned by the Santa Clara Valley Water District. The creek flows in a generally northwesterly direction after rounding the Los Capitancillos Ridge and the town of New Almaden, in the southwest corner, before ambling along the Santa Teresa Hills on northeast side of the Almaden Valley. Its environment has some relatively undisturbed areas and considerable lengths of suburban residential character. Originally called Arroyo de los Alamitos, the creek's name is derived from "little poplar", "alamo" being the Spanish word for "poplar" or "cottonwood".
