We are going to San Francisco

---

Monday 12 - Friday 16 May 2008

San Francisco is a great city, probably because it doesn’t really feel like a city at all, and both Sean and I wanted to stay longer than two nights.

On Tuesday we caught a bus to Fisherman’s Wharf and instantly fell in love with the place. We were walking along the wharf and could hear lots of barking. We looked over and the pier was covered in Sealions. Apparently, they first made their home at Pier 39 after the 1989 San Francisco earthquake and have remained ever since because of the safe waters. We saw more Sealion action in the 20 minutes or so that we were watching them, then i’ve ever seen in a zoo.

We then hired bikes for the remainder of the day and started making our way to the Golden Gate Bridge. San Francisco is a bike friendly town, with lots of bike lanes in the streets and wide paths close to the bay for pedestrians and cyclists. We rode across the bridge to Sausalito and ate fish and chips and finished just in time to get the ferry back to San Francisco. The ferry also drove past Alcatraz, so we got a close up view, but didn’t have time to do a tour.

Back in San Francisco, we carried our bikes up hundreds (seriously) of stairs to visit the murals in Coit Tower and enjoy the view. Luckily, the ride down the hills made the walk worthwhile. From there we cycled over to Lombard Street (the world’s crookedest street). Sean was super keen to cycle down the street, so after a short break, we pushed our bikes up more stairs to the top. Sean zoomed down Lombard Street, but i must have looked pretty funny; creeping down the street with the brakes on nice and hard.

The day was perfect (again lucky, because apparently in May the weather is always foggy or windy), so we sat in the courtyard at the Cannery to have a few beverages (i’ve developed a thing for Millers beer). We moved inside when the weather got cooler and Sean had his first $10 steak since departing Australia, and I had the most delicious clam chowder.

We had a great day, but there was still plenty we missed out on. There are some amazing parks that we drove through on our way out of the city, so we'll have to put those on the list for next time. I also would have like more time to check out the architecture. All of the houses are 3 or so stories high and have the traditional ornate, bay windows - even the new ones being built.

I should just say here that we spent our last couple of days travelling down the coast road to Los Angeles. The views were great and we got to see some pretty amazing houses, bridges and more sealions. We camped next to the beach in the evening and got up the next morning to finish the drive to LA. In LA we drove along Rodeo Drive and Hollywood Boulevard and walked along the Hollywood Walk of Fame. No celebs spotted this time round though!

We spent a very relaxing night at the Holiday Inn (where we got some washing done and even went to the gym) before flying to the East Coast early Friday morning.

---

Photos

Riding Around Town
Lombard Street is in the distance

Stone House
This cool stone house was built on a cliff overlooking the ocean near Carmel

The Coast Road
Between San Francisco and Los Angeles

Comments

[Sean and Megan]

Sean's Words
Escaping from Alcatraz was pretty easy. Cyclying over the golden gate bridge with the wind behind was pretty easy. Carrying the bicycle up to Coit tower, and again up Lombard street was bloody difficult... but then coasting down them was excellent!