Nothing but Fun & Sun in Nor Cal

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We've flown into San Francisco dozens of time and have had great luck with the weather each time; this would not be one of those times. After two canceled flights we got on a third that ended up being three hours later than we hoped.

Fortunately, for us our friend Nash is pretty great guy. He picked us up at SFO a little before 1 am. Our schedule was tight since we know so many people in the Bay area and we wanted to make sure we were able to see as many of them as possible. The main reason for our visit was for our good friend Chris' wedding. He was the photographer at our wedding, a former roommate of mine in San Diego, a friend from my high school days in Oregon and is a pretty cool guy. Since we've been living in China I only had the pleasure to meet his fiancé Yvette once before and Elyse had never met her.

On the first day, we ventured out with Nash and his nephew Preston to the Academy of Science Museum in Golden Gate Park. Elyse and I have always wanted to go in but never seemed to schedule it into our trip. There was an earthquake exhibit which focused on the major earthquakes in the SF Bay area. After the museum Nash dropped us off at our friends’ place, John and Julie, who live on Russian Hill. They live a block away from Lombard Street and the views in their neighborhood are pretty amazing. You can see Alcatraz, Golden Gate Bridge and the Bay Bridge right up the street from their place. This did happen to be the clearest and warmest July we've ever experienced in SF. Typically it’s fogged in and you need a coat and jeans.

We kept it pretty mellow and had a couple of cocktails and waited for Julie to get off of work. We ordered Chinese food and talked pretty late into the night. It was a work night for them so they weren't able to stay up too late. The next morning we walked to the Mission district in search of Clarion Alley Art Project, which we never found. No one had seemed to know anything about it. Essentially it’s an alley with a lot of graffiti art. We ate some lunch then headed to Cal Train to go back to San Carlos. Our friend, Maltman, who was in town for Chris' wedding picked us up in San Carlos.

That night Chris was having a guy’s night out on the town in Palo Alto. I ran into a couple of guys I went to High School with that I hadn't seen since. Also our friends from New Zealand Scott and Negar were also in town for the wedding. They had just announced that they were expecting their first child, which is pretty cool news. Elyse and I meet up with them in Auckland a few years ago and had a blast. Somehow I ended up becoming the designated driver but it was okay since I haven't really been drinking much these days. After hopping from bar to bar we left Palo Alto sometime between 1 and 2 am.

The following morning we made our way back into the city to stay with John and Julie. This back and forth was necessary since Nash's nephew was in town and he was afraid to sleep by himself. That meant either Kendra or Nash was forced to sleep on the couch since we had their guest bedroom. On this day, we were meeting with my college buddy Adam for lunch near his office. After our lunch we walked up to Russian Hill to drop our bags off at John and Julie's. It was about a 3 miles hike and took us up SF steepest hill, Filbert street. The sidewalk turns into stairs since it gets that steep. We took a little break once we arrived at John's before we headed back out. It was still great weather so we headed back down the hill to the wharf.

We sat a while in the park and walked along the sidewalk and watched the street performers. Some were good, some were not so good. We had made dinner reservations at Park Tavern which is owned by Kendra's brother and sister in law. Kendra actually did the design and Elyse and I hadn't ever had dinner there, since it opened Labor Day weekend 2011. John accompanied us since Julie was getting her hair done in the East Bay area. Everything was delicious and the ambiance was great. Kendra did an amazing job on the design. It was so good that John made a reservation for the following night so he could experience it with Julie. If you are in the area we highly recommend the Park Tavern in the North Beach neighborhood.

Friday, was the day of the wedding. We needed to get back to San Carlos early so that we could get ready and catch a shuttle from a hotel in Palo Alto. The wedding was at Thomas Fogarty Winery in Woodside. It is due West of Palo Alto in the mountains and you have to take very windy roads to the top. It was a good idea that there was a shuttle. Of course not everything went without a hitch since we missed our train to San Carlos by 7 minutes. We were forced to wait an hour for the next train. Luckily Kendra had an appointment in Palo Alto around the same time and was able to drop us off at the hotel. This left Elyse and I about 30 minutes to get ready, eat, and get out the door.

The wedding venue was beautiful and the weather was perfect. I think the pics do a much better job than I in describing the area. You were able to see the entire bay area including San Francisco, Oakland and San Jose. We meet many cool people and had a great time. Nash did our wedding deserts and he also made the cake for this wedding. It was of course delicious. We drank a few drinks and Elyse made sure we danced. We all had a great time and before we knew it the shuttle bus was loading passengers. There was a group of us that stuck around the hotel bar where the shuttle dropped us off. There were a couple of other groups there that had weddings the following day so it was pretty packed for a hotel bar.

We rented a car on Saturday and headed south to meet my cousin Sarah, her husband Jeff and their son Blake. They live in the Central Coast area of California but were up to celebrate Jeff's dad’s 70^th in San Jose. We sat in the park and had some lunch. It was a really relaxing afternoon. We got back in the car and headed north to Sonoma to visit more of my friends from college. We typically stay with my buddy Brad, who was my roommate in college, yet this time stayed with our friends Paul and Regina. They both have two kids. Brad is a single father of two twin boys that are two years old. Paul and Regina have a son named Austin who is 5, and a daughter Alyssa who just turned 4. We were there for Alyssa’s birthday party and it was pretty fun.

It was only a two day visit but was nice to catch up with them. I am very happy to have remained in contact with them since it always gives us a reason to visit Sonoma. It's one of our favorite locations in California.

Before we flew out to Chicago we meet with Kendra's sister Kelli, her two kids, Matty 4, and James 6 months and her parents. The area is pretty nice and even Obama thinks so since he spends a lot of time down there campaigning and trying to get money for his election campaign. We meet Kendra's parents last summer at Jared and Kendra's wedding in Tahoe. They were so welcoming and we took an immediate liking to the entire family. So it was a great way to end our Bay area trip.

Elyse wants to add that we took a nice hike through Jack London State Park and didn’t do any wine tasting while we were in Sonoma, both being firsts for us. She is sad that we didn't get to meet up with other Bay Area Travelbloggers but hopefully next time.

Huge Thanks to Jared & Kendra, John & Julie and Paul & Regina for allowing us to stay with you for multiple nights. Until next time!

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