San Francisco

It's been awhile since I've checked in. The past couple of weeks have been somewhat chaotic, between house guests and a trip across the country. I just returned yesterday from five days in San Francisco, where I met up with my friend Lindsay. Her wonderful friend Cristina was kind enough to put us up and show us around while we were there. I thought I'd share pictures and stories here, and I hope to resume more regular blogging now that the craziest part of my summer has passed (and it's not even summer!).

I flew out last Thursday and met Lindsay at the SF airport, where she'd just flown in from New York. We trained it to Cristina's apartment, dropped off our bags, and set out to explore and find a place to eat. Cristina lives in the Mission, which is a cool neighborhood, and the Castro is adjacent -- that was our first destination. The Castro is always the center of San Francisco's gay community, but I'm sure it helped that June is Gay Pride Month. As two straight women, we were definitely in the minority as we walked down the street.

We lunched in the Castro, then made our way to the Haight, where we saw the Grateful Dead house:

We walked around that neighborhood for a bit, popping into a souvenir shop and nosing around Amoeba Music before heading homeward.

That evening we had Mexican in the Mission. Lindsay enjoyed a gargantuan burrito, and I went the boring route with a (very spicy) taco and a scrumptious quesadilla.

On Friday, we took the train to the Ferry Building, which houses an indoor market and several restaurants. We ate lunch at the Market Bar, which was quite tasty, and sat outside to enjoy the beautiful day.

We walked up the Embarcadero and saw an assload of wild sea lions sunning on the docks:

We went to the Aquarium of the Bay, which is small but pretty cool. The sea creatures that swim above the glass tunnels that you walk through come in and out freely from the Bay -- they're not captive. We saw jellyfish...

...anchovies...

...oddly contorted starfish...

...and sharks, among other beautiful creatures:

That evening we returned to the Embarcadero and boarded a ferry for Alcatraz.

We took an audio tour of Alcatraz, which I must say was pretty interesting. It's an eerie place, and the tour is well done. Worth doing.

The cellhouse was cold and frightening, as would be expected, but there were surprisingly beautiful parts of the island, like this view walking down to the dock from the cellhouse. Wildflowers still abound on the island. They were planted by prisoners and the families of the guards, who lived on the island. Imagine being a little child and living on Alcatraz in the shadows of the prison. Chilling!




After Alcatraz, we had dinner at the Stinking Rose in North Beach, a restaurant that's obsessed with garlic.

Then we hit up City Lights, bookstore of the beat movement and the home of Ginsberg's "Howl":

The following day, we set out for Napa Valley. The weather was glorious and the drive was breathtaking. We crossed the Golden Gate, though it was cloaked in fog until we came out the other side:

We stopped at In'N'Out Burger, where I witnessed probably the most chaotic fast food restaurant I've ever seen. The burgers were quite delicious, though.

We visited various wineries and indulged in the fruits of their labor:

Then we headed back to San Francisco, where we had some delicious Japanese food.

On Sunday, we picnicked in Nob Hill with a friend of Lindsay's and her darling baby. We drove to the beach, which was rather frigid, not surprisingly, but nice just the same:

Lindsay braved the chilly waters, but I preferred to remain on dry sand:

And that's the end of my photos. We went to a contemporary dance show that evening, which was entertaining, and Monday was spent in airports and planes, biting nails over delays and driven nearly to insanity by boredom. If only I had taken my laptop with me, I could have spent the day writing this blog.