Traveling
by the Amtrak California express train was quite an enjoyable experience that I
would definitely recommend. It crosses large expanses of land in considerably
short periods, has great amenities on board such as power outlets, free wifi,
toilets, tables & a cafeteria. It's well spaced out too which great for
when you just happen to be located beside a bell-shaped American who's snuck
half a bucket of fried chicken on board. Peachy. Once again the iPad, MacBook &
other audiovisual devices really passed the time in transit. We boarded a coach
in Los Angeles & headed east for 2 hours to Bakersfield (the town that KoRn
are from. It's an absolute dive.) From there we boarded the Amtrak & headed
east for a further 6 hours until we reached San Francisco bay. Jumped in a cab
from the ferry building & landed at The Park Hotel in Union Square, San
Fran city center around 5pm. Starving hungry we dumped our gear at the hotel,
Urban Spooned the nearest decent eatery & found ourselves devouring nachos,
chicken caesar & English draughts at the Irish Bank, 60 meters from our
hotel. ~For those untech savvy individuals, Urban Spoon is an application
whereby it uses your satellite location to find ALL kinds of food joints
closest to you at any given time. Users write reviews, post the menus &
provide contact details. It's a ripper app. I actually downloaded one similar
whilst in San Fran called 'Liquor Run Mobile' that locates all the nearest
liquor venders! Super handy.
San
Francisco reminded me a lot of Melbourne city. The streets are all
criss-crossed in the same parallel way, trams & homeless people EVERYWHERE
with crazy unpredictable weather. The mornings were foggy as hell & cool,
by midday is was sunny & averagely 24 degrees & the night times,
freezing cold & windy.
We
woke up early on Wednesday 4/7/12. Walked down to the Ferry building &
departed on an all day Wine Tour to the world famous Californian, Napa Valley.
Beautiful weather & one of the best tours of the journey so far. We'd
decided prior, that we weren't going to buy any bottles of wine solely due to
the issue of luggage capacity but after a number of different Vineyards
(Franciscian, V.Sattui, Andretti & Rutherford) with plentiful tastings we'd
found some incredible Merlot's, Cabernet's & Chardonnays that were near
impossible to refuse. What really swayed our decision though were two red
blends from V.Sattui Winery. A 2009 Zinfandel & a vintage Madeira, neither
of which are available in Australia & are unlike anything we've ever
tasted. We got a bottle of each. A sharp cheddar & an Artichoke Cream
Cheese too :P We got dropped off at the north side of the bay around 4pm &
took a ferry cruise (through what felt like a category 3 cyclone) back to the
main wharf where we'd departed initially. On the boat ride home we palled up
with a couple from New York who were on the tour with us. Before we'd even
properly introduced ourselves we were sharing beers & organizing a night on
the town together for July 4th. We all hopped off the ferry, went separate ways
for dinner but rendezvoused a couple of hours later for the fireworks &
then an Irish Bar to kick it until the wee hours of Thursday morn.
Thursday
we woke up late, slightly worse for wear but fortunately had little planned. We
walked into Little Italy where I had an amazing shrimp pasta dish & Jacy had the queen
of all crab dishes, the “Dungeness Crab” for brunch at a little place
named "The Stinking Rose" where their motto is "we season our
garlic with food". The remainder of the day was spent touring the city on
foot, visiting the farmers market, various shops & surrounds. In the early
afternoon we developed an insatiable hunger for an Ice-cream Sundae. We Urban
Spooned a number of ice creameries, of which were all around a 35+minute walk
away. This wouldn't have usually been a problem & we'd already been
strolling about for almost 2 hours at this stage but the stomachs were
a-rumblin' & after taking the long route home, observing menus in the
windows in the off chance of a Sundae, we returned to the hotel deflated. What
perked our spirits up though, was the cheddar, cream cheese, crackers &
beers that we got stuck into during the afternoon. We decided to hit up a place
named "Burger Bar" located on the 6th floor of the Macy’s building in Union Square for
dinner. What a win! The most amazing burgers we'd encountered thus far (WITH
curly fries) and what's that for dessert? A 3 scoop banana split Ice-cream
sundae you say?!#@$ Shortly after, an eruption of high fives, star jumps,
confetti & fireworks* could be heard ringing throughout the San Francisco
bay area. Who even cares what happened the rest of that night....
*confetti
& fireworks may not have actually occurred, but almost certainly did.
Friday
we got up, bought a couple of tickets for the Hop On Hop Off bus route that
tours the city & went about our own travels. It was bitterly cold & we
were both sitting atop an open roof, double decker bus with mucus stalactites
hanging from our noses when we arrived to the California Academy Of Sciences.
The California Academy Of Sciences (CAOS) is a truly fascinating place. A four
story building with every exhibit imaginable, an entire floor that's nothing
but tropical rainforest & the rooftop being completely covered with native
Californian vegetation. Amazing. What we didn't account for though, was the
hoards if stampeding, obnoxious American children that littered the entire
building, clambering beneath every step we took. No exaggeration, I have never
seen this many children crammed into one area ever in my life. The place stank
of cereal & adventure. The situation became very taxing by around the 2pm
mark & we opted to venture elsewhere. We hopped back onto the bus into
Haight & Ashbury, the hippie area of San Fran. We wandered around there for
a while soaking up the culture, checking out all the incredible old school
music stores, clothing shops & cafes. Jacy bought a limited edition
Metallica vinyl from Amoeba Music that she was particularly chuffed about. We
heard from our New York friends shortly after so we organized to return to
Haight & Ashbury for dinner that night. We bussed it home & trammed it
back several hours later that night for a pretty wild evening of beers, jäger bombs, buffalo wings &
miniature burgers (sliders). The town quite literally kicked us out at 12am
& after growing bored of running amok in deli's we split a cab home. We
said our sad goodbyes & swapped numbers so we can catch up when we land in
New York in August. Can't wait :)
We
woke up Saturday at 6am in a world of pain. The ringing alarm silenced only by
the thumping in our heads. We were being collected for an all day tour to
Yosemite (Yoh-sem-it-tee) National Park at 6:45am at the Ferry building. To
make matters a shitload worse, we discovered that somewhere between the taxi
& hotel last night I had lost my wallet. By some miraculous stroke of luck
we'd taken out all major cards before going out the night previous, my only
huge loss was my license/I.D. With nothing much we could really do & the
tour bus waiting, we ventured to the pier & set off for what would become a
16-hour tour, returning us to our hotel at 11pm that night! It was a truly
mesmerizing day, so many picturesque sights & tranquil landscapes of 3km
high monoliths, waterfalls & fresh water streams. There really isn't a
great deal I can say to describe how beautiful this place really was. The
photos will give you a very brief insight. Like I said, the tour left at 7am
& returned to our hotel at 11pm so that was our 16-hour day at Yosemite.
Exhilarating & brutally exhausting.
Sunday
saw us pack up all our belongings, make a few calls in search of my lost wallet
to no avail and then proceed to a car hire place, pick ourselves up a set of
wheels, check the hell out of San Francisco & make an 8hour, 406mile(654km)
journey to Anaheim. From the temperamental weather of San Francisco through the
43-degree Californian desert to the dry 37-degree heat of Anaheim. The summer
sun couldn't have come sooner for us.
We
had a great time in San Francisco & it's a really beautiful city with so
much to do & see but the wallet fiasco was number 3 in our string of bad
luck. So good riddance to it. We're headed for hot weather & roller
coasters! See you all on the other side.
See accompanying photos "San Francisco, Napa Valley & Yosemite" gallery. [Photo's may be delayed. There's a large abundance & our upload medium regularly claps-out.]
