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Published: April 27th 2014
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MC couldn't make it to NZ with me this time but she could meet me halfway - for nine days in San Francisco and some of the other highlights of Northern California.
We were pretty blown away by San Fran from the outset. We walked down "Valencia" near where we were staying in the Mission District (they don't say "Valencia Street" or "Valencia Road" in America apparently). We seemed to have beamed down on one of the trendiest places on Earth. London is cool and we're no squares, don't get me wrong, but this place was quite overwhelming. The hipsters had moved in and the whole area had become totally gentrified. The first grocery store we walked into had the finest produce - fair trade this, organic that - and the manager who befriended us on the spot had one of the most immaculate beards I've ever seen. We passed numerous design shops, pop-up chocolatiers and cafés where you would have felt out of place unless you were working on an Apple computer sipping slowly on a frappe with almond milk.
So that was Valencia. We hopped across one block to Mission and the tone of the neighbourhood changed
instantly. This was an Hispanic neighbourhood with sketchy bottle stores ("sketchy" means "dodgy" in American English), small Evangelical churches on every block, and best of all for us: Burrito bars! We found a place jammed with locals where the woman serving didn't look surprised in the slightest that MC ordered in Spanish. After tucking into gloriously greasy burritos and tacos washed down with Corona, we continued on down Mission. After a few more blocks the atmosphere changed again, and not in a nice way. We had delved into one of the large pockets of San Francisco that are populated primarily by drug addicts. MC was fearless, but we could still only manage a couple of minutes of walking through gangs of seriously high people before turning back towards Valencia to our trendy, gentrified little slice of paradise.
Maria Chiara made a triumph of organisation with our accommodation. My original plan had been to book a hotel - I found one that looked good in every way except that according to internet reviews it had many homeless people on the nearby streets. MC had the far better idea of staying in someone's house (using Airbnb). She found an apartment house
in the Mission district near Dolores Park - which would be the London Fields of San Fran. Our hosts were a professional gay couple, Gary and Jefferson. Now these guys were stylish. In the "water closet" (that's American English for "toilet") they used CK One as air freshener! I was humbled. Gary was an insurance broker by trade - although he was a lot more fun than that sounds - and a major art collector. There were paintings in every room and on every available wall space. In our bedroom there was a painting with a life-sized male figure with body paint making him look like a bohemian super hero, with phallus on show. That this was the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes every morning was a quite confronting experience. But hey, this is San Fran, baby! Gary was excited about his next purchase; the same artist had painted one of his female friends as an hermaphrodite. Pity we missed that one. Ahem.
We had breakfast most mornings at Dolores Park Cafe. We had American-sized portions of granola, scrambled eggs with lox (salmon) and most especially mouth-watering French Toast. We never quite managed the breakfast
burrito: I can hardly comment, having never seen or tried one, but... really?? Outside the cafe there were long queues of people that I would describe as "geek chic" waiting at an unmarked bus stop. Rather than a normal bus, a large and comfortable coach with a very cryptic destination sign would pick them up - cryptic so that you would only understand the destination if you were
supposed to understand. Someone explained to me that these people are "techies" who live in the city and commute en masse to Silicone Valley to companies such as Google, Amazon, etc. I am not exaggerating when I say that every single one of these people would be holding an over-sized Starbucks-style portable coffee mug. The sight was slightly scary.
San Fran is a melange of neighbourhoods with quite distinct characteristics. Below I have put together a list of just a few of the famous areas:
Mission: Hispanic vibe, great Mexican food
North Beach: Bohemian vibe, great Italian food
Height Ashbury: Hippy vibe, great cafe food
Embarcadero: tourist and port vibe, great seafood
Chinatown: Chinese vibe, great Chinese food (funny that)
Tenderloin: Drug addict vibe, we
Height-Ashbury
The crucible of hippydom didn't stick around to try the food
Nob Hill: posh vibe, couldn't afford the food
Exploring these neighbourhoods - particularly the areas with the distinctive wooden Victorian houses - was such a pleasure. We worked out a good system to deal with the terrain: walk on flat and downhill, public transport uphill. On a cable car I was elbowed quite agressively by a driver, but I was standing in the wrong place so I had got what I had deserved.
Gary was very proud of us for getting a booking at top restaurant Frances. I believe his actual words were "oh,
chiiiiic!" We'd actually had to book months before. It was in the heart of Castro. There is a giant rainbow-coloured flag as you enter the neighbourhood... this is the gay district! Frances was just one example of what a gastronomic and retail paradise this city is. That very day we had been in the main shopping area, Union Square, spending substantial amounts of money on clothing - particularly at the Levis store. We made up for the strangely cheap prices by buying in bulk.
I won't go into detail about why we loved the De
Pink blossoms
At the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park Young Museum and the Japanese Tea Garden, both in Golden Gate Park. This is because there will be many people who may find descriptions of the Georgia O'Keeffe exhibition and cherry blossoms boring. If you are one of these people I have two things to say: 1. You're a scumbag! 2. Thanks for reading our blog!
We rode bicycles over the majestic and unusually coloured Golden Gate Bridge and explored Marin Country, which includes some of the most pleasant and affluent parts of the Bay area. If you were a hippy in the '60s and then did very well in the '80s then you probably own a very expensive property here. This is where the mountain bike was invented. With our mountain bikes we very nearly missed the last ferry from Tiburon back to San Fran when the locals kept sending us on scenic, hilly, long routes.
San Franciscans are really friendly. I've been told since that in fact most Americans are like this. On a couple of occasions MC and I would be sitting at a cafe agonising over some logistical factor and a local on another table would pitch in with pertinent advice. The whole Californian
new age positivity trip might seem bizarre from the outside but when you're there it's absolutely great! All of the "have a great day" and "thank you so much" can't help put you in a good mood.
San Fran is one of the nicest places I've ever been: with the ocean, the bay, beautiful architecture, a cosmopolitan and liberal society, a vibrant economy and friendly people, enormous choice in shopping and eating, and (at least when we were there) good weather and no fog! The city may be the jewel in the crown of Norther California, but there are so many other delights beyond the city in every direction. In our cases we visited the wine country to the north, Big Sur in the south and Yosemite National Park in the east. But they are stories for another blog!
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