Blogs from San Francisco, California, United States, North America - page 6

Day 2: Thursday, November 18th, 2021 We woke up early in the morning to head out for breakfast before heading over to the Alcatraz ferry dock scheduled to leave at 10:00. We had breakfast at the nearby IHOP. With time to spare, we headed over to Pier 39 to see the sea lions before taking the ferry to Alcatraz. Some interesting facts about Alcatraz include it housed famous prisoners with the likes of Al Capone, Machine Gun Kelly and the Birdman. There were also various escape attempts; none are known to be successful. The prison closed on March 21st, 1963. After Alcatraz, we had a quick lunch at Pier 39 before heading on out Painted Ladies Tour of San Francisco. Some of the famous sites of San Francisco witnessed on the tour include: Lombard Street- famous ... read more

Chase Center is the new home of our Golden State Warriors, and this will be my first visit. The pandemic has delayed several previous attempts to attend a Warriors game here. They broke ground here on January 17, 2017. The architect was Manica Architecture. The $1.8 billion arena was privately financed by the Warriors. The area is known for being the home of UCSF Medical Center and Kaiser-Permanente. Starting in 1964, I have seen the Warriors play in several different venues: old Civic Auditorium (Chamberlain vs Russell) in downtown San Francisco, the old Cow Palace (Championship in 1975) in South San Francisco, the Oakland Alameda County Coliseum, SAP Center in San Jose, and finally, the new Chase Center in Dog Patch, aka Mission Bay. The team has $2 billion under contract from a cluster of founding ... read more

One of the few remaining icons of old San Francisco, is John's Grill. I first became familiar with it, when my waiter , John Konstin, at Jack's on Sacramento Street bought John's in the 70s. Here is some interesting background. Nestled in a building two blocks from Union Square and not far from San Francisco’s big convention center and major hotels, John’s Grill has been hosting celebrities from all over the world for more than 100 years. It was created in 1908, only two years after San Francisco’s devastating earthquake. Indeed, John’s Grill was the first downtown restaurant to open after the quake. It quickly became a bustling anchor in the city’s multi-faceted life – hosting a beguiling and lively mixture of politicians, cops, journalists, entertainers, lawyers, business leaders and the just plain curious who wanted ... read more

Recently, my partner and I went for a weekend away to San Francisco. We were planning on exploring much of the city on foot. I had been there once before, many years ago. For Tom, it was his 1st time there. Before heading to Point Bonita Lighthouse in the Marin Headlands, Tom and I required breakfast! We parked in a small car park just off Irving Street in San Francisco and set off to walk down Irving Street. The first breakfast place we came across was the Crepevine and it looked really interesting. We both love crepes, but the last few times we got them in Colorado.... let's just say they were disappointing. So we were excited, but somewhat nervous to try something new! Outside the restaurant, there were a few tables and chairs which were ... read more

In a desperate move to get their share of the dwindling sports entertainment dollar, baseball begins tonight without fans in the stands. With substantial numbers of players testing positive for Covid-19, I wonder how long the season will progress. Then, looking at the NBA bubble approach, also without fans, hockey, auto racing, and limited schedule college football, we will finally have something to watch on TV besides old movies, and cornhole and dart tournaments. From the WSJ: "To reach opening day, Major League Baseball devised more than 100 pages of health and safety protocols, navigated an ugly labor dispute and survived an abbreviated 'summer camp' without a coronavirus outbreak,""Now, after a four-month delay, America’s pastime is finally back. But starting was the easy part. The real challenge begins now, as MLB tries to ... read more