Spring has sprung

What better way to spend a sunny afternoon than riding around the Seawall at Stanley Park.[gallery orderby="rand"]

a golden ride

In a lot of places I visit I have a mini Bucket List of things I want to do. In London it was walk the Monopoly Board, in Seattle it was ride a ferry boat. In San Francisco there were two things: ride the cable cars (check) and go over the Golden Gate Bridge. My original plan was to run over the bridge but I didn't pack my running shoes and opted out of buying a new pair to keep my luggage at a minimum. So instead I decided to ride over it.

Unfortunately San Francisco had other ideas. When I woke up on Thursday - my first and last full day in the city - I was greeted by rain. Despite my protests that it was not supposed to rain in California, which Barclay thought was amusing, it didn't let up. So instead of rising early, I slept in a little and took my time heading into town to find some breakfast. I waited at the end of one of the cable car lines - in the rain - for ages for a carriage to come around. The rain was only really a drizzle but enough to put tackling the bridge off the agenda. I grabbed some breakfast in what could well have been Little Italy, but I'm not sure. Then I ventured up to the Cable Car Museum. It was free and it was still wet so that was good enough for me. A little while later I emerged to sunshine! I couldn't get down to the wharf quick enough to hire a bike.

The ride out to and over the bridge is supposed to take about 45 minutes. It took me a little bit longer because I kept stopping to take photos...lots and lots of photos. There were a lot of tourists on the bridge, but mainly at each ends. Not many seemed to be trekking across. But there were plenty of runners and cyclists making the crossing. At the other end the road weaves down into Sausalito, a waterside town that Brad, from the dining cart on the train, had recommended I visit. I locked up the bike, walked around, had some lunch and took a lot more photos. The town was full of galleries, cafes and some expensive looking jewellery stores. There was a Starbucks though - disappointing.

The bike hire company provided maps for more routes from Sausalito so I headed in the direction of Tiburon, however after not making much progress on the map and the ferry time nearing, I decided to head back instead of risk not making it back to the city in time.

It was a perfect time to cruise back to the city. The ferry took about 30 minutes and went passed Alcatraz, which I've decided not to bother visiting, and gave me some great views of the bridge with the sun setting behind it. After riding back to the bike drop-off point I headed back to Pier 39 (which I've decided is the worst place in SF) to see the sea lions, which I missed last time. I forgot to read the information about why they are there, but they are, and they're funny.

Barclay was working pretty late so I killed time by riding the F-line street car for nearly its full route before jumping off and going back in the other direction. The second car I got on used to run in Milan but was given as a gift to SF. The city liked it so much, operators then ordered 10 more when Milan decided to retire them. Back downtown I had some dinner and then walked a lot of blocks (up hill and down) to a bar near Barclay's house to meet him for a drink. Climbing back up the street after a couple of G&T's was fun though!

hippy love and cable cars - must be san francisco

Have you heard of the Summer of Love? Well San Francisco is where that all went down. In 1967, San Fran was the place for hippies. The Haight-Ashbury neighbourhood welcomed up to 100,000 people (thanks Google) and was the centre for the hippie revolution. Decades later, the area hasn't lost its hippie charm. Haight St is still lined with record stores, vintage clothing shops, smoke shops (mainly the other kind of smoke shops) and colourful murals.

After arriving back from Sacramento a little after lunch, I jumped on the bus up the hill to Haight-Ashbury. I had travelled through here on Monday and was keen to head back to explore. Haight St is interesting in that some parts of it are as they were 40-odd years ago, others are made to look like they were there 40-odd years ago, and others, such as the local Ben & Jerry's ice cream store, make no attempt to fit in. For every genuine vintage or thrift store, there are five newer stores selling look-a-like items at three times the price. There is even an American Apparel store. Stores have names such as Soul Patch or Earth Song.

Back in the day, acts such as Janis Joplin and Jefferson Airplane lived in the area. Hunter S Thompson wrote about it. And people wrote songs about it. (San Francisco - be sure to wear flowers in your hair was written to promote a music festival in the neighbourhood). There's a mural on one of the shops featuring the Forever 27 club - or at least some members of it. Brian Jones, Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison and Kurt Cobain are pictured - they all died at 27. There is talk to do another mural to feature some more recent deaths such as Amy Winehouse.

After trolling up and down Haight St for a good while, I headed back down the hill towards Alamo Square. This is where heaps of people stand to photograph the Painted Ladies..the row of colourful Victorian houses, with the backdrop of the Financial District behind them. I'd seen them on the bus on Monday but figured it might be a nice place to visit. The walk to the area was actually more fun. San Francisco is full of old Victorian houses, and you can paint them any colour. Out the front are often huge trees and the streets are pretty quiet making for a beautiful walk.

Once I'd visited the Painted Ladies again I kept walking in the direction of one of the Cable Car routes. Three days in San Francisco and I had yet to ride one!! The Cable Cars are the only moving National Treasure, and for a few reasons I'm surprised they are still in operation - not least the fact that it would be really easy to fall off and end up in the street. Surely there are insurance concerns there. There are three routes still running. I hopped on the California St one, which runs only along this street, into downtown. The fares are $6 one way or $14 for a all-day pass. With a few hours to kill before meeting my Couchsurfing host I decided to spend the rest of the day riding the Cable Cars around town.

Running the cars is a two-man job. One guy each at the front and back to operate the brakes. While there was, of course, heaps of tourists jumping on and off, commuters seem to use them a lot too. One guy told me he was only going a couple of blocks but it was all uphill. After going up and down quite a few hills on the Cable Cars (resisting the urge to scream "wwwwwweeeeeeeeeeeeeeee" as we did), I can't say I blame him. After riding the California route into town, I caught it half-way back up and switched onto one of the other lines heading to the Fishermans Wharf. At the end of that line, which weaved through some more residential areas, I saw them turn the car around. They drive it onto a little turn-table, then physically push the car around. Again, a two-man job. Then it drives back out onto the next-door line to go back the other way. I walked a couple blocks along the wharf to reach the third line, which down this end, is a bit separate to the second line, but in a mile or so, travels along the same route. I stayed on until California St then jumped on that route again to head back downtown to meet Barclay, my host for the next two nights. By the time I met him about 8pm, I'd covered nearly every inch of the cable car route!

slammin fun in sacramento

Hot dogs, screaming fans, cheerleaders and an edge-of-your-seat finish - Sacramento Kings v Utah Jazz had all the makings of a perfect basketball game.

I'm not a huge basketball fan and I don't follow NBA at all, but I wanted to see the best of the best. These teams might not exactly be that, but it's as close as I'm going to get for a good while. The arena is not remotely close to town and there is NO public transport that runs out there at game time, but luckily Aimee, my Couchsurfing host, had a friend going to the game so I scored a ride there and back.

Shane, Aimee's friend, said the games used to sell out all the time, but about seven years ago the Kings started playing pretty poorly and the fans lost faith. Even though they are doing better, it's nothing impressive and the fans have yet to get fully back on board. It wasn't helping that the team was considering moving, a decision that was officially put on the backburner this week when the Mayor announced a new arena will be built for the Kings, closer to the city.

I found my seat at the end of the first quarter. I was surrounded by fans holding pretzals, giants cups of Pepsi and yelling at nearly every call the ref made. Vendors selling pizza and fairy floss trolled the aisles, just in case your super-super size meal wasn't enough. On the court the game moved fast. Really fast. There wasn't more than two points in it for most of the game. If one team got the edge, it lost it just as quickly. But the game almost seemed to come second to the on-court shenanigans that went on during time-outs and the period breaks. As soon as the ref called time-out, the media would flock to the court for a presentation for Black History Month, a cheque donation, to say happy birthday to a guy who's had the same court-side seat since the arena opened, or a visit from the Mayor. It was the last event that had me hugely confused. This guy comes onto the court and the crowd goes crazy. Turns out it's the Mayor. Rightio. Don't think the mayors back home get that kind of reaction. I found out later that the Mayor is Kevin Johnson, a former NBA All-Star and also the man behind the new stadium deal that the King fans are all excited about.

At half-time the antics continued. Musical chairs with people in giant Pepsi, Dr Pepper and Mountain Dew costumes, dances from the cheerleaders, free stuff for the crowd...it went on. On court the game stayed close. With less than a minute to go there were still only two points in it - with the Kings in front. A few penalties and some quick shooting and the lead went out to six points by end of the game.

a suburb of art

Getting off the bus stop at the corner of Mission St and 16th Ave didn't look like a very good idea. In fact, had it not been my destination, I might have stayed on the bus. The intersection is the unofficial entrance to the Mission District. It is made up of two main streets: Mission St - home to a large Mexican community - and Valencia St - the more 'hipster' area.  The Mission is starting to become one of San Francisco's most popular neighbourhoods, known for its eclectic mix of stores, cafes and night scene. But at first glance is looks nothing more than a dirty, grungy area where I should probably keep my expensive camera hidden.

It was early when I jumped off the #14. Not by my watch (it was about 10am), but the streets were still waking up. The homeless were still asleep, the fruit and vegetable store workers were unpacking deliveries and many of the cafes were still closed. A little bit unnerved by some of the characters on Mission St, I headed one block up to Valencia and noticed a change straight away. Instead of taco shops there were trendy coffee houses and so-called gourmet burger joints. One of the attractions in The Mission is the
murals. Some of them are commissioned art projects, but many alleys are covered in what some people would call graffiti, but are pretty incredible pieces of art. I got talking to a couple who were walking through the alley. The guy was a bit wary of my camera as he was tagging some of the murals. He saw me taking a photo of a colourful mural reading "Capitalism is Over" and told me that "they don't like that kind of thing". "That's why they've hacked it already." Apparently the piece is pretty fresh but already has a few tags over it (has been "hacked") because people don't like it. The guy pointed to a piece next to it, which didn't have any political message, and said most people preferred that kind of stuff and therefore left it alone.

 

A little before noon I headed back into the city to catch my bus to Sacramento. This time I skipped the bus but caught the BART. Partly because I love that San Francisco's subway system is called BART and also because it was a quicker way to get to the Greyhound station. On my North American Bucket List is seeing an NBA game. The season hadn't started when I was in New York last year and it will be finished by the time I'm next in Toronto. As Seattle and Vancouver don't have teams, I figured this might be the only time I have to catch a game. The nearest team to SF is the Golden State Warriors, based in Oakland, except they don't have a game while I'm here. But the Sacramento Kings do so I booked a ticket to the game, one for the bus, and found a Couchsurfing host.

I was a little disorganised when I arrived. I thought the Greyhound station was more in the city centre but found myself near a freeway and no idea how to get anywhere. Luckily when I rang Aimee, my host for the night, she wasn't doing anything so came to pick me up. I usually wouldn't Couchsurf when I'm only in a town for one night and especially when I had plans (the basketball game) for most of the time I'm here, but when I had a quick browse through the profiles out of curiousity I came across Aimee's and she looked pretty damn cool. And she was. We headed straight to her work, which happens to be an Irish pub, and grabbed some late lunch and a drink before heading back to her place for a few hours.

I hadn't realised Sacramento was the capital of California. It just seemed like an such an unremarkable city compared to some of the others in the State such as LA and San Francisco. But perhaps that makes it a perfect choice. The Downtown area is apparently pretty boring, and I certainly got that impression as we drove through - a lot of important-looking buildings and very bad landscaping in a failed attempt to improve the city's appearance and atmosphere. Aimee lives in Midtown, an area full of homes built in the 1920s, cool shops, cafes, bars etc. Aimee's house even has the drop down ironing board and dining table in her kitchen. Unfortunately the owner has removed a lot of the other original fixtures.

Aimee is studying Environmental Toxicology, part time, as she is also working and raising her four-year-old son Mason, who is pretty damn cute. Very friendly, obviously used to having lots of new faces around, and very smart. I spent the afternoon chatting to Aimee and learning about dinosaurs from Mason.

At 7pm it was time to head to the game.