Our jaunt started off
innocently enough with a 2-hour drive from the Sacramento area. I started off
driving, because Ken had to play with his new toy, a Dell Axim. What is it
with boys and their toys? When we reached about 2 or 3 miles from the Bay Bridge
we met up with traffic, lovely. Ken told me that the day before some nut
case decided he wanted to end it all, and chose the Bay Bridge as his jumping
point. But, he didn't jump, instead he hung out on the bridge while the police
tried to talk him down. He alone backed up traffic from about 8 am to later that
afternoon. I'm sure the morning commuters were just a bit upset.
Navigating San Francisco in a car with manual transmission was an adventure in itself.
Our hotel was conveniently located up hill from where we exited the highway.
"Go up this hill, and make a right. Now go up this hill and make another right.
Hey this one's down hill, but lets make another right." Well, why the hell didn't
you just make a left? That's because about 90% of the street are all one way. Oh,
did I mention that we went through this process about 3 or 4 times? We couldn't
find the hotel at first, or second, so we "went around the block" again. Then we found it but
didn't pull up in front of it, and couldn't back up, so we went "around the block"
again. It was a good thing that the hotel had valet parking or else Ken and I
would have choked each other. Before we ventured around the block for the last time,
I jumped out of the car to find out some information for Ken. As I walked up to the valet
station, I heard someone call my name, it was my Uncle Paul. He, my aunt and Krista just so
happen to be eating lunch at the cafe next to the hotel. We stayed at the
Marine Memorial Club and Hotel
The hotel was built as a living memorial to all the Marines who lost their lives in the
Pacific during World War II. The front lobby area was like stepping into a museum. They had all sorts of
memorabilia in glass cases dating back to the civil war, both World Wars, Korean, Vietnam, and even the
Gulf War. Plaques and pictures of Medal of Honor recipients dotted the lobby as well. There was
a sense of calm in the lobby, the same calm I felt when I visited the Vietnam War Memorial.
After we claimed our room key and a brief visit to said room, we headed off to the hotel where
my family was staying, The Fairmont San Francisco.
The hotel was located about 3 blocks from our hotel, definitely a good thing. However...
The hotel was located 3 blocks away--up hill. These were no sissy little hills, they were freaks of
nature hills. They must have been a good 24-25% grade inclines. Not good if you're wearing heals,
or drunk I imagine. And how on earth do people move into a house that sits on one of these steep streets?
You need some really good brakes to drive in a city like this. When we arrived at their room, things were a bit
in disarray.
Krista and Ryan's rooms were made and ready for them, but my uncle and aunt's room was not. They were not happy.
So the hotel offered them two more rooms. Same price but a bit smaller. They opted not to take the smaller
rooms and just waited for maid service to clean up the room. The rooms they had were nice, they had walk in
closets and a mini bar. My aunt hid the keys to the mini bar from my cousins and uncle.
Once everyone was organized, we left the hotel and walked down to
Pier 39; tourist hell.
We wandered around a bit, and checked out the very noisy and very stinky California Sea Lions. If you're in need of a
good chuckle, don't pass up the chance to see these adorable marine mammals. It was now time for dinner and Fisherman's Wharf was our
next stop. We ate at one of the oldest resturants on Fisherman's Wharf,
Alioto's. This place has a wonderful
selection on their menu, and the entertainment wasn't that bad either. One of the waiters couldn't handle his overloaded tray
of food, he lost his balance and dumped the whole thing on the floor. If he would have leaned a little more to his right, our whole table
would have definitely worn the food. Despite the little excitement we endured, we had a great time. I would have had an
even better time if I weren't taking Comtrex.
The next day of our weekend, my uncle, aunt, and cousin Krista met us at our hotel for breakfast to plot
our adventure for the day, Ryan decided to sleep in. Our plan of attack: China Town, Coit tower and Sausalito.
Sausalito is a quaint and rich little area where you can do a bit of shopping--an up scale tourist trap. After we ate breakfast,
we went back to our room, grabbed our tourist gear and met up with the others.
China Town was our first stop. There was nothing too exciting going on, just browsed a few shops and took a
few pictures. Along our way, we stopped at St. Mary's Cathedral, my aunt was
ecstatic about this. The next stop on our
journey was Coit Tower on top of Telegraph hill. The inside of Coit Tower is pretty cool. The tower is, well, round; and murals
cover the whole lobby area. You can venture up to the observation deck via a tiny elevator. I choose to sit that bit
out and watch everyone's coats in the lobby. The ferry ride to Sausalito was a bit choppy, but nothing too drastic. Ken and
my uncle milled around taking pictures of Alcatraz, the San Francisco sky line, and each other.
Sausalito was a neat and rich little tourist area, lots of quaint little shops to spend money in. We spent a few hours
wandering around, going in and out of shops, and taking pictures; then it was time to head back. The ferry didn't go right back to San Francisco,
it made a stop first at Angel Island--and that's where Ryan got off. Not really thinking, he figured it was our stop, even
though it didn't look anything like the dock area where we originally boarded in SF. It was a good thing that my
uncle noticed him walking down the gang plank, or else Ryan would have had to walk back to the hotel. Actually, my uncle thought it
was our stop too. He was getting ready to film all of us walking off the ferry when he noticed that we didn't walk off the ferry.
He then asked someone if we were at San Francisco... nope... "RYAN!"
All of this ferry riding made us hungry, so we jumped into a couple of cabs and made our way to a Spanish
restaurant called B44. What a neat place this was, and the food was outstanding... except for the rabbit dish, that's what
I ordered. I took one bite, and it was a dry and dull as Al Gore's humor. So the waitress too it back and replaced it
with a vegetarian Paella--yummy, double yummy! While we were munching on
appetizers and sipping on our drinks, this
guy walks into the place, blows a whistle (I thought we were being raided or something) and starts to sing a tune
from the Wizard of Oz. The restaurant staff pushed him out and shut the door behind him. Well, he wasn't done yet. He
tried to get back into the place, but the waiters weren't having any of it. They leaned on the door to prevent him from gaining
entry. I believe my uncle filmed the event. After dinner, we walked back to our respective hotels.
After breakfast the next day, Ken and I took our time going home. We
stopped at a couple of outlet stores and did a bit of shopping.
