Advertisement
Published: July 18th 2008
Edit Blog Post
Hotel Beresford
Our Hovel for 4 nights On the streets of San Francisco
After being processed by SFO airport, we fell out onto the sidewalk and were scooped up into a black Lincoln towncar by a Turkish (I think) driver who knew how to type an address into a SatNav. No criticism due there though, he delivered us promptly and in a timely fashion at the front steps of the Beresford Hotel in Sutter St. First impressions of SF were that it is more built up than I (Mark) had assumed, and also that there are far more steep streets than I was prepared for. We checked into the Beresford and went up to our room, being simultaneously surprised by a) how small the rooms were and b) the fact that it seemed to smell of a mixture of musk and wax. Or, to put it less politely, wee and furniture polish.
After a small amount or room customisation we had fitted into our meagre accommodation and were ready for a little exploration time. Firstly we wandered around the Union Square area. This was quite compact and laid back, but the placement of such monuments to materialism such as Macy’s and Bloomsbury’s around its perimeter made its
Union Square
Smaller than we thought it would be... Bohemian claims seem to be a little pretentious. From here we began a pursuit of wi-fi internet access, eventually ending up in the Golden Gate Perk Internet cafe, which served a good ginger and honey tea and satisfied our need to check accounts and blog.
We decided that the experience of Chinatown should come next, and went through the elegant entrance gates looking for food! It really is a fascinating place - ‘antique’ import shops rub shoulders with bazaars and restaurants, in streets laced with lanterns and containing scatterings of pagoda style architecture. Jack’s bladder dictated a stop in a local square, where locals played cards, old men chatted and the younger generation burnt off some energy in the playground. We found a restaurant close to here that was listed in the Lonely Planet guide and ordered some staple Chinese dishes. It was enjoyable and good value, but I’m sure Jack’s most vivid memory will be the live fish being plucked from the tank as fresh provisions.
After the meal we wandered into some rather bizarre bazaar style shops, which offered a strange mix of goods - murderous and obscure martial arts weapons, giant insects mummified in Perspex, silks,
cutlery and crockery and feng shui paraphernalia. The kids bought some nick-nacks and we headed back to the hotel, where the lure of sleep became too great to resist, at least for the adults.
Pancakes and Tour
A disturbed night where we were up at 1am in order to ring Orange and complain that our phone wasn’t working and then to ring the bank to ensure that they would authorise the payment for the Fiji part of the holiday (before it gets cancelled on us for non-payment).
Breakfast today was at Sears Fine Food - recommended by the Lonely Planet guide. The kids (all three of them) had pancakes, bacon, maple syrup and butter whilst Annabel had porridge and banana. The pancakes were around the size of scotch pancakes and there were 18 of them on each plate. Needless to say all three little piggies managed to eat the lot. Talk about heart attack on a plate.
After ensuring that we needn’t eat again for a whole week we set off to our (now) favourite internet cafe to blog.
Next was an unplanned walk to find Union Square (we went the wrong way down one road
Alamo Square
Victorian Houses for quite a while before Annabel admitted that she’d got it wrong and we turned around). Once at Union Square Mark conned the ticket seller for the open top tour bus to give us a free ticket for Jack (saving $16) and we boarded the bus.
One thing that has surprised us about San Francisco is how windy it is, so imagine sitting on an open top bus in the wind and then thinking it was a good idea to go across the Golden Gate Bridge whilst still sitting on top! Cor Blimey! Think of Cousin Itt from the Addams Family and that was what Ellie looked like for most of the journey. We could barely open our eyes to see the view, let alone talk to each other. Once we’d crossed the Golden Gate Bridge we hopped off the bus (apparently you aren’t allowed to use two legs to board the buses as they are “Hop on - Hop off” buses) and warmed up by standing in the sun whilst looking at the spectacular but slightly hazy view. We made sure we sat inside the bus on the way back.
The next destination was Fisherman’s Wharf and
City Hall
View from the Bus Pier 39. Tourists and tacky shops are in abundance here and we mooched about for a while. The highlight of Fisherman’s Wharf has to be the fruit stall where we purchased huge cherries, strawberries and the biggest nectarine we’d ever seen. They must love their GM over here as fruit surely can’t grow this big naturally. There was also a WWII submarine tour with torpedoes outside: we were beginning to expire though so hopped back on the bus and got off at Sutter Street to relax in our hotel room for a while.
Eventually the fatigue ebbed away from us (assisted by the TV and a tutorial game of gin rummy for Jack’s benefit) and the adult contingent decided that food was now a priority. Amidst complaints from the junior members of the party we walked down to Lori’s diner, where they soon changed their tune! This was a great kitschy overdone 1950’s American style diner with a ‘50s car on show inside, bright red glitzy vinyl seats, juke boxes at each table and polished chrome everywhere. The menu matched the decor, with custom hot dogs, burgers, pasta and salads at a reasonable price. Mark had a blue burger
(blue cheese sauce), Annabel had a cup of chilli with salad and onion rings, whilst both the kids had hot dogs and fries. These were accompanied by a set of fantastic malted milkshakes. We left the place satisfied and bloated, and managed to support each other far enough to get to our room, where we collapsed and passed into an easy sleep after a little TV. A good day.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.164s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 10; qc: 48; dbt: 0.0818s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
phil
non-member comment
packing it all in?
sounds like you are making the most of it. is the bushman still around at fishermans wharf? the most affluent tramp you will ever come across! sounds like you have great weather. watch out it can change in a minute. do alcatraz if you can, its quite surreal. enjoy.