<p>I'm in the Bay Area actually. I'm sure there are nice places in Oakland. Near the mayor's house can't be too shabby.</p>
<p>lol. Jerry Brown, the mayor of Oakland, is well known for living in Downtown Oakland locales. For some time, he lived in a loft in the Jack London Square area before all of the current residential development there (<a href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/05/13/BAG2UCNTMH1.DTL)%5B/url%5D">http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/05/13/BAG2UCNTMH1.DTL)</a>. He currently lives at 27th and Telegraph, which is not the worst, but clearly not the best part of Oakland. (Check out this fairly recent blog entry about a protest at Jerry Brown's house <a href="http://angrywhitekid.blogs.com/weblog/2005/01/protest_at_jerr.html%5B/url%5D">http://angrywhitekid.blogs.com/weblog/2005/01/protest_at_jerr.html</a>)</p>
<p>Take a look at <a href="http://www.oaklandnet.com/%5B/url%5D">http://www.oaklandnet.com/</a> highlighting a photo of Lake Merritt on the main page and lots of info about Oakland</p>
<p>Thanks for the literature. I can't wait to spend a fun-filled weekend in Oakland!</p>
<p>not sure how you define fun-filled, but I think you'll have to ditch both Berkeley and Oakland and head into the city.....</p>