Day 19 - San Francisco

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This morning we got up and made our way down to the harbour by way of Muni with every intention of hiring bikes and riding along the wharf. When we got down there it was overcast and dreary and the wind was howling like anything. We decided to give it a miss as we had plenty of other activities to do with our GO Cards. We walked up to Bay street where we took the historic cable car up the hills to only 2 blocks from our hotel. It was a great experience and amazes us how they work.

We headed back to the car and made our way over to Alameda where we hopped onboard the USS Hornet. This navy ship is famous for all the battles it was involved in as well as being the rescue and recovery ship for the Apollo 11 capsule which contained the first men to walk on the moon, as well as Apollo 12. The size of this ship was certainly the largest we have ever stepped foot on at over 270 metres long. We got to tour and see the sleeping berths, the mess and kitchen, the first aid rooms (which has a really awful smell to them), the torpedo room (where the torpedos where stored), the hanger deck, the flight deck, navigation bridge and the island. This ship was primarily used for a landing place for aircraft during WWII (mainly B-52 Bombers) and Vietnam. It was really interesting having the opportunity to tour this ship. The girls even got to “steer” the ship.

Our next journey was to the Chabot Space and Science Centre which was located high in the hills at Oakland, just out of San Francisco. We got in there and went straight to the cafeteria where we had lunch. The girls then went in to the Discovery Lab where they had all sorts of activities to do like looking through a microscope, tracing pictures through a light box, marbles and lots of other activites too.
We then went on to watch the show in the planetarium. It was called Tales of the Maya Skies. It was really cool how we layed back in our chairs and watched the show over the whole ceiling and walled area.
Next it was in to see the planets and there were little activites we could do from time to time. The girls did some bubble science and light science as well.
We were hoping to be able to look through the telescopes but we didn’t stay late enough to be able to join in. They have 3 telescopes there and they are HUGE. They even told us that looking through one of the telescopes you could see the sun bubbling!

It was then off back to the hotel where we relaxed for a couple of hours before going to sleep, ready for tomorrows adventures.......

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