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Published: January 11th 2013
View from apartment
This was the first night, love these fire escape ladder things- very American TV cop showToday we fly to San Francisco via LAX with Alaska Air. Enjoy the last CM lunch before catching a cab to the airport. It has been such a great trip. Just as well we are leaving- my body is hurting in all sorts of odd places- you know those tiny little intercostal ones for instance (AKA Trapeze Muscles!). The flights are comfortable, we clear customs in LAX with absolutely no queue and no fuss. This would be a great way to enter the US next time- seriously no queue and a pleasant experience (? how is this possible?? the usual terminal is nightmare and takes >hour. Ultra boring few hours in LAX (we actually succumbed to the dreaded McDonalds- I still don't know what possessed us) before the SFO flight. Cab it to Ricks Apartment in Chinatown. We rented it through airbnb- 2 brm, 1 bathroom place in the middle of Chinatown.
https://www.airbnb.com.au/rooms/244361. Callum and Christine are already there having flown in from Vancouver, it is now about 11.30 at night. Tomorrow we are going to catch up with Lachy, we havent seen him for 6 months and we are really looking forward to it.
The apartment is great, very
View from apartment
next morning- the karaoke shop is revealed clean, well fitted out, has wifi and a desktop mac and is looking great for 5 nights. I really like being in the middle of Chinatown, it's busy and noisy and interesting. Our windows look over Grant Street; across the road is a chicken processing shop and an electronics and souveneir shop. The electronics shop specialises in karaoke machines and it opens at 8am, the owner is out on the footpath every morning "singing" karaoke and she is DIABOLICAL, but she seems to love it. We dont love her. By the end of the week we still don't love it or her but I love that she loves it ... (At the end of our stay Rick tells us that she has been there for 2 years and he has yet to see any improvement!) Next door is a Chinese Restaurant and on the other side is, wait for it,................... a karaoke bar...... When we walked into our bedroom when we arrived there were little packages on the bedside tables- intriguing! It seems Rick supplies ear plugs! We didn't use them, I actually quite enjoy the sounds of the street- the rubbish guys at 4.30 am, the chicken delivery guys
Farm:Table
looks promising? at 6.30 am, the karaoke lady at 8....
Anyway, the 5 days in SF is basically to see Lachy and do some sightseeing. Here goes
18th Dec
We are going to meet Lachy for breaky at a 'fantastic' breakfast place. We turn up- the breakfast place is shut (Lachy knows his city!- it became a recurring thing for lachy's choices for the week) so we wander around and find
farm:table, it's in the Tenderloin area. It looks very cool and the barista turns out to be an expat Aussie. We sit at the communal table and enjoy our introduction to the SF food scene- great coffee, really fresh and interesting food.
http://farmtablesf.com/index.html .I feel at home, I feel like I am in Leederville and then I don't feel so good. The vague rash that developed and came and went yesterday and the day before is back- BIG time, still not sure whether it was an insect bite in Mexico or a contact reaction from going off the beaten path into the swampy bit of the Aszlan Parque. Anyway, an antihistamaine, a clinic visit (kaching $, kaching $ - $160 thanks) and a course of steroids nailed it-
Farm:Table
Great food, menu changes daily based on fresh produce available whatever it was. The day ends up being somewhat low key.
19- 20 Dec
What we did • Ferry Building/Farmers Market at the bottom of Market Street on the Embacadero- this is a really cool historic site, it was established in the late 1800's and was the hub of trade in SF. It has been overhauled and now operates as commercial premises and a food market. The renovation is stunning and it is a very interesting spot to spend a couple of hours. The food produce here is highly regarded and includes stores selling cheese, fish, meat, bread, fruit and veges, gourmet grocery, teas, etc. There are also a couple of coffee venues, a book shop and some restaurants. We tried the famous Bluebottle Coffee- it was ok, not awesome. You can get free guided tours here twice a week- maybe next time.
http://www.ferrybuildingmarketplace.com/ • Huge city walk- covered many kms taking in some fantastic urban art and inner city park space. It's a great city for walking. It's a great city for food- lots of interesting little hole in the wall delis, food trucks, etc. Had some great sandwiches from a Russian
Art
I love this - very colourful set against the tall buildings place
• Went to Lachy's house- fantastic shared house in Haight-Ashbury, lots of really quirk shops around it and some really interesting houses and apartments.
• Golden Gate Bridge- spent several hours here. We were really lucky with the weather- it was clear and sunny. Not sure what all the fuss is about re the changeable SF weather! Got to the visitors centre in the early afternoon- they were very helpful there with suggestions, maps, etc. There's also the ever present gift shop. We had a fantastic walk along the California Coastal Trail taking in the various viewpoints. We took the steps down to the beach and stopped down there for a bit. Headed along the coast before walking back and over the bridge during twilight. It was actually quite warm to start and we got down to tshirts at one stage, as it got later each of my 5 layers went back on- very chilly on the bridge by nightfall. Took tons of photos. HIGHLY, highly recommended.
• China Town- tacky- yep, home of the $2.99 TShirt, but really interesting. Lots of food shops (it felt pretty familiar). Lots of restaurants. Lots of
bakeries selling egg tarts. Lots of graffiti art on the walls (including a Banksy). A photographers dream.
Where we ate • Magnolia Pub and Brewery
http://www.magnoliapub.com/they do a great breakfast/brunch on the weekends apparently, we were there midweek so kind of had an early lunch for breakfast. Cool place.
• Restaurant Franchino on Columbus Ave
http://www.yelp.com.au/biz/franchino-san-franciscoold style Italian, family run. Good traditional food.
• Little Dehli (Indian Takeaway- delivered) - quite different to what we are used to- spicier, but very good.
Transport Mostly by foot. However, we caught a few taxis through a company called Uber Cab (Uber is a
venture-funded
startup company based in
San Francisco, California that makes a
mobile application that connects passengers with drivers of luxury vehicles for hire). This concept is soooo Lachy! It was great- good price as there were 4 of us, and the cars were really clean. We did the bus home from the GGB which was fine but took a really long time. There are a lot of transport options for tourists including 1, 3 and 5 day passes that cover buses, trains and cable cars- I think if you are travelling alone or as 2 they are
very economical and easy to work out.
Starting to get a little bit sad, only a few more days.
PS- I apologise in advance for the number of bridge shots- it is a pretty speccie structure though
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