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Published: June 23rd 2017
Lombard Street
Very steep and curvyGeo: 37.7792, -122.42
So far this has been somewhat of a laid back trip by our standards. I am writing my blogs in the morning which allows Alex time to get some additional sleep. Don't get me wrong, I still run the boy around quite a bit, but he has been hanging in strong. Yesterday we woke in our host Victor's place, gathered our things, then headed out with San Francisco on our radar. About a 45 minute drive, we entered the city. I kept seeing the Golden Gate bridge off in the distance while Alex screamed that is not it, the Golden Gate bridge is RED!!! Well that's kind of dumb, maybe the gates will at least be Golden. We navigated the city in what seemed like a giant circle due to all the one way streets, finally arriving at our hotel. Expensive by our standards, but still a bargain for the city, we were kind of worried by the neighborhood. I had misinterpreted our map. Apparently the distance to the waterfront is a lot further than depicted. Going with the flow, we checked in and discovered we had a nice room after all. Once we had our bags in the
Sea Lions at Pier 39
Guess they weren't feeling frisky room, we were off in the car in search of the famous windy road of Lombard St. The entrance to this street is located at the top of a hill that is so steep that when I parked the car, it felt like we could roll sideways down the road. Obviously, we were not the only ones planning our drive down this unique road. Fortunately for the people whose houses are actually on the curves, our speed was limited by the congestion of tourists pushing their brakes to the limits. I am sure we are not the first to think how much fun it would be to head down this road as fast as possible. Besides the obvious draw of this being the curviest road, it was absolutely beautiful as it was adorned with flowers all the way down. It was a real site to see. Looking past the bottom, the view of the city and bay was awesome. After our ride down, I parked the car and while Alex honed his videography skills by recording some time lapse video while I ran up to the top of the street and down the other side. The temptation was strong to
rip my shirt off and run down the curvy street screaming past Alex. I saved him the humiliation of association, this time. Following this, we headed down the hill to the waterfront where we found Fisherman's Wharf. Here we saw the many street restaurants serving up fresh chowder, crabs, and other types of seafood. Yes, later Alex and I did have a delicious bread bowl of chowder. We played tourist, not really, we are tourists, and headed down the waterfront to pier 39 in search of sea lions. Unfortunately, the resident sea lions felt the need to extend their family lines by swimming out to rookery islands away from this area. No one told them we were coming to town. We were able to see a few straggler sea lions, which apparently were not in the mood, still hanging around on a dock. Wondering on, we watched a couple street performers, one who ended his show early due to a lack of audience. He made the poor choice of competing against another guy a short distance away who stole the show. Tired from exploring the area, we returned to the car and headed up an extremely steep road to Coit
Tower. The view from the top of the hill was amazing and the ride up and down the hill, just as much of an attraction as the tower. Retiring early to the room, we relaxed and rested. Surprised? Yes, so was I until I figured out on oncoming cold and revenge of the butter soaked garlic French fries I had earlier were knocking me off my game. Tomorrow, we will explore the city some more and stay another night in town.
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Melissa S
non-member comment
I'm glad you guys did Lombard St... as touristy as it is, it's definitely something to see... I couldn't believe how steep it was! Looks like you guys are having great weather! Where did you guys have your chowder?