San Francisco, part 2

We had a little more of an agenda on the second day: see sea lions, see Golden Gate Park, and walk the Golden Gate Bridge. All this stuff appeared to be on the western end of the city, and since we were staying on the eastern side, we decided to start the morning with a long ride on the bus. After some somewhat unsettling moments sitting across from a woman wearing a gas mask and then a person with several trash bags full of something (actual conversation- Brian: "I wonder what that man had in all those trash bags." Alice: "That wasn't a man.") we made it to the westernmost point of the city, Sutro Heights Park. We walked around the park a bit before heading toward Seal Rock, near the Cliff House Inn. Unfortunately, there were no seals or sea lions, but the views were nice:


We then walked to Golden Gate Park. After seeing some bison in the northwest area of the park, we took a bus to the Japanese Tea Garden and the arboretum, where we spent some time looking at plants before hopping back on the bus to the Golden Gate Bridge.

We walked all the way across the bridge and back (round trip about 4 miles). It's really an amazing structure, and thanks to the beautiful weather, we had fantastic views of Alcatraz and the cities across the bay.



Back on the bus, we were still determined to see sea lions, so we headed for Fisherman's Wharf. We stopped at Fort Mason, where we saw a weird statue, and then Alice found a place where, it being happy hour, we could eat really cheap food as long as we ordered really expensive beer.

We finally got to Fisherman's Wharf (a gigantic gaudy tourist trap if there ever was one) and finally got to see our sea lions. True, they mostly just sat there like giant tired slugs, but sometimes they would bark at one another and occasionally duke it out, as only noisy giant slug-like creatures with no arms can.


We took a cable car back to the hotel. You might not think that a 9 mph ride up and over the ridiculous hills of San Fran would be that exciting, but you'd be wrong. It's not exactly a roller coaster, but you do get that feeling when you crest the top of a hill and begin the downward plunge. (It only lasts a few seconds of course since the thing stays at a constant speed).

Dinner that night was at Fleur de Lys. Yes, for you Top Chef fans, this was the site of the first episode, and those famous words "You have to leave the line." I had veal sweetbreads with lobster and caviar, pan roasted halibut, noisettes of venison, and chocolate mousse. She had asparagus salad, Hawaiian prawns, Colorado lamb loin, and the FleurBurger: a "lightly spiced dark chocolate ganache, home made Biegnet Cherry milkshake, and frozen fennel-flavored ice cream 'pommes frites'."