Our stay in
San Francisco felt like it went really fast. We arrived at SFO around 9am on Tuesday morning. It was a long five hour flight from DC to
San Francisco but we had a pretty good time flying on the new Virgin America Airlines. The in flight entertainment was completely up to the individual using touch screens in the seat back in front of you. We could also order snacks and drinks on the screens and have them brought to our seats within a couple minutes. By the time we landed in
San Francisco we were tired. We had woken up at 4am and even though I had a nap on the plan I was still ready for bed. So after taking a cab to our hotel near
Union Square we immediately crashed. After a nice long nap we went for a walk.
Flynn and I quickly realized that our hotel was almost in the center of what appeared to be San Francisco’s main shopping area. We walked passed Louis Vitton, H&M, and Bloomingdale’s. The weather was a little cool but certainly not cold and a bit overcast. We found a tasty French Bistro on a small side street and enjoyed our meal while listening to actual French tourists eat their meals. After a quick stop into Sur La Table for a specific product (the Lacey peeler) we continued on our walk. We walked through Union Square and headed back to the hotel. We were tired and ready to call it a day. It had been a short day in that we hadn’t done much, but it had been a long day.
The next day we found breakfast on our way to our first guided walking tour. It was on Nob Hill. It was about two hours long and very informative. The views were great and the weather was perfect. After the tour we walked down through Chinatown and to the water near the Bay Bridge. We found lunch at a diner along the way and came up with our plan with what to do next. Next was Lombard Street. After eating we walked all the way to the famous curves of Lombard Street. Along the way we found the Coit Tower and some scenic spots. Lombard Street was crazy filled with tourists (like ourselves). We took a few pictures then realized we would have to go up the hill to catch our Cable Car back to the hotel, so up we went. From the top we could see all the way to the waterfront. The fog was thick on the water though so we couldn’t see what was out there. It wasn’t until a couple days later that we found out that directly through the fog was Alcatraz. Eventually we got on a cable car and made our way back toward Union Square. After all that walking, another low key night in was in order.
The next morning, with the help of Yelp.com, I found us a very popular place to have breakfast in. Unfortunately, it’s a little too popular and we had to wait for what felt like forever. After forty minutes or so we got seated at the bar and watched the cooks work the griddle. I had French Toast (my favorite) and Flynn had mondo pancakes. We were quite sated when we left. After breakfast we decided it was time to figure out something to do with our growing laundry situation. We hadn’t done laundry since Philadelphia, so we were due. We went down to the basement of the hotel where the coin operated wash machines were. For $2.75-3.75 per load we opted to not do our laundry there. I don’t need clean clothes that badly. We decided a temporary fix would have to do. After another nap (and some serious blogging (four in a day, I think that’s a record!)) Flynn and I went shopping. That’s right, rather than wash the clothes we had, we decided to buy new clothes and hope our next Inn would have laundry facilities. To be fair I just needed socks and underwear and Flynn just needed boxers and a couple shirts. Now that we had fresh clothes to hold us over a couple days we were free to continue on our touristy way.
For our last full day in San Francisco, Flynn and I headed down to Fisherman’s Wharf for another free walking tour. Unfortunately, this one was not nearly as good as our previous two. It wasn’t as informative and we spent too long on a horribly rank smelling pier. Besides that the Wharf was fun. We got free chocolate from Ghirardelli Square’s Ghirardelli chocolate shop. We also saw tons of crabs being sold in stalls and clam chowder in sourdough bowls. We could also finally see Alcatraz Island and the Golden Gate Bridge because the fog was far enough back. After walking around the Wharf for a bit we took a cable car back up to our hotel. For dinner we found an Irish bar around the corner. It was a fun low key evening.
All in all San Francisco was fun. It was a lot more similar to Seattle than I had expected though.
We like to hang out with good ol' Abe when we have spare time.
