Fresno As A ‘Basecamp’ For Stuff, Put To The Test

b6845aa5-9c3a-4bc7-a921-c1727bdeb113 Fresno As A ‘Basecamp’ For Stuff, Put To The Test
Downtown Fresno shots by Nick Pisano at the Road Goes On Forever

I have always said that Fresno is a great basecamp for visiting the Sierras, most notably our three nearby National Parks: Yosemite, Kings Canyon, Sequoia. But I had never really known of someone that actually did it – someone not from here anyway.

A dude named Nick Pisano is spending a year traveling (sounds like a sweet gig if you can get it) with his partner and recently spent a couple weeks using Fresno as a basecamp.

This long blog post by Nick documents his use of Fresno as a base for visiting our nearby parks and … Bakersfield ?‍♀️ -that is actually a cool part to me, but anyway.

It is a overall good blog post illustrating how a tourist can use Fresno as a basecamp, I want to make that clear. 

Buuuuut.

He gave us several shots throughout the post. He tried to be nice about it, but definitely didn’t pass up on chance to deal in digs:

“Not a lot going on here”

“I’ve gone out in search of Fresno, as it were, multiple times here and come up relatively empty each time.”

“relatively sleepy”

“The key to enjoying this city is lowering your expectations”

“a kinda bad city next to some very good things”

“I say this with the utmost respect, but there’s just not a terrible lot going on here. In some ways, it’s the least-happening place we’ve been.”

Woah. Pretty rough.

I will give him credit for going to a Fresno Grizzlies game, the Tower District, and bonus points for visiting the Underground Gardens. He seemed to enjoy those, as he should.

He certainly didn’t do all the things though.

In fact, one major mistake: He did not seem to have much (if any) Mexican food – most notably no mention of tacos:

Yep, you KNOW Mike Oz is taking that dude on the taco tour of his life next time.

Speaking of food, going out to eat is a feature for Fresnans. Part of our culture is eating out. When someone visits us, we plan on eating places. It is a “thing to do”. 

You can make fun of that if you like but I think it’s cool. It’s a Fresno feature that is underrated. 

Also, this guy seemed to not be familiar with the concept of a small city. A working class city. A city for living a life.

Not every town is built to give a shit about tourists. Fresno is one of them.

We don’t have a beach. We don’t have Disneyland. There are no longer any cable cars. A Hollywood sign doesn’t loom over the town. We don’t have a Vegas Strip. We have no plan for someone hanging out for two weeks.

What our “sleepy town” has is people working their ass off and living a life.

Fresno: California’s Base Camp

C6BDDD8F-E38F-4B82-8516-D586CB9870DF Fresno: California’s Base Camp
Yosemite Valley Pic by @markian.b on Instagram

People can shit on this and I get it, you shouldn’t brag about things not technically in your city, but hey man: it’s pretty fucking cool we can get to everything rad in California by lunch time.

  • Tahoe
  • Yosemite
  • San Diego
  • Your Mom’s
  • Monterey
  • Las Vegas (ok it’s Nevada, but still)
  • San Francisco
  • Disneyland
  • Shasta (a late lunch)
  • Russian River Brewery

ALL BY LUNCH!!

1C97256F-FC5E-412E-A25C-7D9BBC5FCA6C Fresno: California’s Base Camp
Zachary’s Deep Dish Pic by @restaurantgroupie on Instagram

I can go have a pizza at Zachary’s in Berkeley right now, FUCKING WATCH ME.

Then go have some beers at Faction and look at this view:

F36DCC5B-CCED-45E2-AF86-A37E55CF54D4 Fresno: California’s Base Camp

Then have some sucker drive my buzzed-ass back home for tacos in downtown Fresno, LIKE. A. KING!

AE2C9DD4-D608-4F84-9943-E9C56A44CB75 Fresno: California’s Base Camp

Can Austin say that? Fucking Kansas City? Chicago? Atlanta? Boston? Pittsburgh? Either of the Portlands?

NO! They cant say these things! Cities don’t talk.

But if they could? Well, they would say “I wish I was where Fresno is.”

How Are We Going To Make Fresno “Cool”, Yo?

Phoenix-rootop-bar How Are We Going To Make Fresno "Cool", Yo?

We have a problem here. A problem I bounce around in a post from time to time but never take on directly.

What will it take for Fresno to be considered a cool city?

If you’re thinking “Hey, but wait, I already think it’s cool!” I don’t disagree with you, but we both have to acknowledge that we are in the minority, chief.

How do we make Fresno appear cool to an outsider? This is what I’m talking about. To a Fresno State grad, we lost to brain drain? What can we do to win that person back? It’s a question that Fresno creatives have been wrestling with for many years.

First. The Immovable Object.

We are land locked, no getting around that. Except that we are not as landlocked as Denver, or Boise, or Dallas, or Every City Not On The Ocean. We can go to the beach for a morning surf session and be back in town for a late lunch.

So while this is tough, we have workarounds, it could be a lot worse.

The air sucks. It does. But, the past couple years, it feeeeels like it has gotten better?  And if California can (continue?) to lead in clean air…stuff and things? Maybe I’m being naive but I feel like future technology and regulations will make the terrible air a thing of the past. But we definitely need to be a lead-city on clean air initiatives.

Booze May Be An Answer.

Here might be a cool city suggestion we can work on:

Rooftop whiskey bars, eh? I definitely like the idea of rooftop things – like the pic at the top of the post from a Phoenix rooftop bar. And adding a niche element like whiskey is the kind of thing that pushes something from being “Oh that, you can find that in every city.” To “Oh that is rad, I wish we had one of those in our city.”

That unique, “can’t put my finger on it why it’s cool but I just know it’s cool” thing is really what we need to get at here in Fresno.

Touting our agriculture backbone. Being sunny almost every damn day. Embracing our sports, like the soccer community that gets bigger every year:

We’re just spitballing here.

The Cool Roots Are Taking Hold.

We have things already going for us. Not many cities can boast that they are a “basecamp city” to three National Parks. One of which, Yosemite, is considered by many to hold the most beautiful place in the world, Yosemite Valley – and I am in complete agreement with that.

There are other signs of coolness brewing as well. Bitwise pushing Fresno into the tech and startup scene is a big one. The rising craft beer and coffee scene. Branding ourselves as the Capitol of Tacos. These are the kind of things to ride into the cool town sunset.

So let’s tally up some of the cool stuff we got and the stuff we can do more of:

  • Agriculture.
  • Craft Beer – even more breweries.
  • Bitwise and tech.
  • Tacos.
  • Sports – including soccer.
  • Diversity.
  • Leader In Clean Air.
  • Outdoor city – more trails, parks, and owning the Sierra Nevada closeness.

This is but a humble start of a list by a blogger that only went as far as Fresno City College – a great community college, btw. I know only bits and pieces of things. So I choose you to comment and help.

What are some of your suggestions? Leave a comment! On the August episode of Flowing With Famous, myself and Joshua Tehee will parse them out and talk about them on the podcast.

Cool? Cool.