We have been planning this trip for years; well, maybe not
planning, but certainly talking about and imagining it. My friend Betty, who is born and raised in So. Cal just like myself, had never been to San Francisco. Both our 40th wedding anniversaries were this year so we made the decision that this would be the excuse to finally get her there.
Betty, her husband John, Steve and I sat around one afternoon and booked our flights and hotel rooms. That, in and of itself, was an experience. Prices for rooms in SF are very expensive. We sat on all the sites like Trip Advisor, Kayak, etc. watching rooms get reserved right out from under us because we couldn't make a decision in time. We found a room in an old boutique hotel that was in our price range and seemed centrally located for us to play tourist.
One thing I don't like is when a group gets together and asks - 'what do you want to do?' with the response always ' I don't know, what do you want to do?' Hoping to prevent that scenario, I pulled out the map of the City and divided it into quadrants and listed possible things to see and do on each day. We prebooked a tour of Alcatraz and knew we wanted to ride bikes over the Golden Gate Bridge. Two days covered without even trying!
We arrived early Tuesday morning at SFO and took BART into town, dropped our bags at the hotel and hopped on a cable car to Chinatown.
We wandered around Chinatown, found lunch at one of the many restaurants then decided we had it in us to make our way to the top of Coit Tower.
If you have never been to Coit Tower, let me tell you, there are
A Lot of steps and stairs involved! The view from the top was well worth the slog to the tower itself from the street and then the many steps to the top.
We were pooped so we went back to the room for R and R. Dinner was Taco Tuesday at a neighborhood bar. The drinks were cheap and the food was good.
Wednesday was reserved for our ferry ride over to Alcatraz Island.
The tour is self-guided and we were able to wander around at our leisure. After the tour, we hoofed it to Fisherman's Wharf in search of clam chowder in a bread bowl. Betty found bread, that's for sure!
We Ubered back to the room before worrying about what we would do for dinner. Steve took a walk around the Marina district and checked out the Palace of Fine Arts. We would be going that way tomorrow.
Thursday was the day we were all looking forward to. We got up early for breakfast at the Buena Vista, famous for their Irish Coffee.While we were waiting for the Buena Vista to open, we popped next door to rent our bikes and it was a good thing we did that early because after breakfast there was a huge line that we avoided.
After a false start, that I am not allowed to elaborate on, we headed out to the bridge.
The weather was perfect, the sun was out and not too warm.
That's the scarf i bought for 3 Bucks in Chinatown!
Here I am reenacting a scene from the movie Vertigo. Great classic with Jimmy Stewart.
The bridge was more crowded than we had anticipated. People were walking on the wrong side of the bike path and not paying attention. We had to be very careful...
I love this picture of Betty! Makes me laugh every time! Sorry, Betty!
We got over to Sausalito without incident. Had lunch and rode around a little, checking out the million dollar homes and the houseboats that didn't quite look a million bucks. Time to hop on the ferry back to SF. We loaded the bikes on to the ferry and enjoyed another spectacular bay view.
That night we payed a visit to Betty's relative by marriage who bartends at a Japanese restaurant downtown in the financial district. The generosity of the staff overwhelmed us! First off, we were treated to our own specially concocted drink and then the food just kept on coming compliments of the house!
I ate sooo much! I was sooo full! It was wonderful!
This was our last night in SF and what a way to cap it off!
We never made it over to Golden Gate Park, but we all agreed we will save it for next time. Because, surely, there will be a next time! Betty and John were excellent traveling companions and we were all left wondering why we hadn't done this trip sooner!
