Our vacation began in Edmonton and the final destination was San Fransisco. I seriously questioned if we would make it but we did and had a rather enjoyable experience overall.
Unlike most people that travel there. We stayed outside of the actual city, camping in Marin, Mt Tamalpais, California. It was a pretty cool site, nice facilities overall. Only catch is we were not overly prepared with our backpacking stuff and had to drag all our camping stuff up a hill. Phew! But it was enjoyable. Except when Mark kept beating me in stettlers of catan. Stupid game.
The other hitch was we had planned on bussing into SF in the day as we were by a bus route. However, the Parks host reccommended we do not as it will take way longer with transfers and such. So we drove through the toll (Golden Gate Bridge) everyday (still awaiting the bill in the mail). Actually quite easy, contrary to all the travel sites Mark read, saying not to drive. We were worried that parking would become a problem as that was what was said in the research but we found meters by the pier one day and a parking garage the other. Meters were cheaper for 1$ an hour!
Once in the city, we checked out Pier 39. Very cool shops. One devoted to just socks (I'm a sucker). Others were electronics, puzzles, clothes, sea shells, Christmas, tourism, fudge and candy (where I found my new love for salt water taffy). The food was great too. Fish and chips, coconut shrimp, crab and shrimp bannock, clam chowder. We got our fill of deep fried goodness!
At the pier, we could also take in a great view of the city, sea lions, boats, Alcatraz and the bridge. Unfortunately we didn't get a chance to tour Alcatraz as it was pre-booked a month ahead till August 15. If looking to do this in the future, it's best to buy a package deal or a city pass as we were told on out last day. We found out too late. But it's never too late to go back again!
Loved the houses. I truly was fascinated by them as we walked through the city (the Full House theme song may have played in my head). We reached ChinaTown where we found tons of interesting items from dried sea horses, shrimp to sea cucumbers. Very busy and bustling.
After that we hopped onto a cable car. Too cool watching how they worked that. It takes two people to operate them! Crazy. And did I mention that their transportation is so neat as they had buses and cable cars operating from the many decades before us? Loved it.
We made it to union square where we walked to the ferry station (basically a grand central station for boats). Back to the pier and then headed back to our site.
The next day we took a rocket boat ride in the water. Good fun. Then drove to SF park. Here we had a most hilarious expedition on the Surrey bike. I really wanted to go to the park and rent bikes. We were there for such a short amount of time I figured biking around would be an easy and quick way to explore the ginormous park. We found the rentals and Mark saw the surrey bikes.
Looking interested we rented those. The guide told us it was easy and that we could get around the park in an hour through a series of left hand turns. So we were off on our double bike (which I might add had two steering wheels...but after five minutes I realized mine was just for show).
Let's just say that we failed miserably at the directions as we ended up going up hills. And with a one speed bike that is hard. We ran into a Segway tour three times during our voyage and they chuckled and said we looked like we were working hard. A rollerblader may have come by and gave us a push and mentioned we looked like we were having a lot of fun. And Mark had me in a fit of laughter telling me to "push it" every pedal up the hill. Thus me slowing down as I was crying from laughing so hard and him pushing harder. Even better was the downhill where if we had a runner beside us they may have put us to shame. In the end our hour covered probably only 25% of the park. But it was fun and we got a SF ice cream treat so we were rewarded valiantly. Even the Segway tour operator who ran into us again (on the same tour) saw us eating made the comment that we earned that!
That was the end of our wonderful SF adventure. After that it was onward up the US 101 to Canada. Till next time. I will start at the beginning then!
Love
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