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San Francisco is a city more reminiscent of New York than anywhere in California. The buildings are all tall and cramped in, but this gives it a more city like appearance than somewhere like LA that is just block after block of squat ugly buildings. This does however make it a nightmare to park! we spent our first couple of hours in San Fran trying to park somewhere. The hostel we got into was more like a hotel & me & jake were given a double room with one small double bed... that's San Francisco for you!
on the first day we walked around the town, relaxing in the park with the locals. I felt a bit homesick here as i looked around at all the groups of mates sat around chatting, having bbqs and playing football, & i began to miss my mates. we moved on & stumbled into a festival in the North Beach area. there were hundreds of young people chillin on the grass with beers listening to a jazz band. It was a nice atmosphere as the sun was shining & everyone was having a good time. we wanted food and beer, but the prices were
pretty high for people on a tight budget. $5 or a hotdog & $5 for a beer. Jake had the former & I had the latter (we've both got our priorities) the thought to share didn't occur to us. San Fran, on the whole, was quite an expensive city, especially for beer. On the 2nd night we went to a Baseball game & were suprised at how cheap it was to get in ($12 in the cheap seats) but were shocked by the $8.75 beers! they weren't even a pint! & baseball is the kind of game to need to be drunk to truly appreciate!
During the days we explared the city & harbour. We took a small boat around the harbour and under the golden gate bridge which, for $15, was a real bargain. On the last day we took the tour of Alcatraz prison which I was really impressed with. They gave you these headphones so it was like you were own guided tour with sound effects and interviews from the people involved. I was disappointed they didn't lock you in the cells though. The tour ended (obviously) with the gift shop where, among other crap, you
could buy dvds of the various alcatraz films for $23 and despite you being able to pick them up on ebay for a tenth of the price some idiots were paying for them! We also visited china town which was an experience, especially the fish shops which sold every type of water animal from fish and squid to toads, all still alive (if barely) in overcrowded tanks.
At night we generally got pissed. we tried a few of the local bars the first couple of nights. One night i got chatting to a Peruvian guy who claimed all English were racist. While walking the streets we'd get hassled by (male) hookers asking if we "wanted to party?" the other nights we took the cheap option and bought beer from a local liquor store & drank in the hostel with the other backpackers.
When we left San Francisco we drove back to LA stopping in Monterey bay to take a whale watching trip. we got a couple of beers and sat in the sun for a while before we got soaked as the boat threw waves across the deck. We sailed for about 2 hours like this and were
well on our way back, gutted that we'd not seen a whale when the boat pulled to a stop and then a huge spout of water burst from the sea just in front of us. I went a bit giddy as i'd never seen a huge whale this close before. It was a Humpback whale, and a couple of times it lifted its huge tail out of the water for the money shot, but my camera was too slow to capture it. It was still an incredible sight.
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David Thatcher
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Bike Ride
Hi Danny, looks like the trip is going brilliantly - bringing back lots of memories of last year and I am very jealous! If you are still near SF it is worth hiring bikes, you can cycle over the Golden gat bridge, free wheel all the way down to Sausalito on the other side for lunch then get the ferry back to SF... a really good day out when we did it!