Tanya and I spent four days in San Francisco this past week for her birthday. The airfare cost $22.40 and the hotel cost $4. Yet, somehow the trip ended up costing $1,635.14. This also included the tour of Alcatraz ($76.70) and the Mission District Food Tour ($148.21), neither of which I would recommend.
It also included $380 for two massages each. I always come down in favor of a good massage. The breakdown was: Food = $501.03, Transportation = $385.40, Entertainment = $620.91, Miscellaneous = $8.67.
In terms of exercise: On 4/6 walked 8.7 miles, 18,955 steps, 9 floors; 4/7 walked 9.3 miles, 20,719 steps, 9 floors; 4/8 walked 7.7 miles, 16,937, 33 floors; 4/9 walked 6.4 miles, 13,982 steps, 4 floors.
On 4/6, we visited the Ferry Building Farmers’ Market and ate lunch there. It consisted of a donut, some empanadas and many free samples. The market represents a part of SF culture. It represents the part of SF culture that likes to be seen — white, upper middle class, locavores. We then got massages, had a drink at Cafe Zoetrope — a place I liked, though I don’t love fancy cocktails. Then we had dinner in Chinatown.
On 4/7, we had the first of three meals at the Millbrae Pancake House. I had the same thing each time: 2 eggs over easy, bacon and Swedish pancakes with coffee. I am a bit of a traditionalist about my breakfast. We took the bus and Bart into the Mission District. This may have been my first time on a public transit bus. We did the foord tour which fed us mission-style burritos, pupusas, oysters and ice cream. It also included a stop at Good Vibrations — a store that solid vibrators. After that we went to Haight-Asbury and Golden Gate Park. We then Ubered down to Little Italy for an Italian dinner.
On 4/8, we were up and out early and took public transit in to Pier 33 (or as close as you can get), had a bagel for breakfast and boarded the first ferry to Alcatraz. Alcatraz was much smaller than I expected, only about 50 cells and is fairly unremarkable except for the island part. You can do the island in an hour easy. If you want to see a penitentiary, try the Eastern States in Philadelphia — much more interesting. When it was over we got some really good pizza and headed back to Chinatown for another massage and another sit at Cafe Zoetrope. We then took an Uber up to the Palace of Fine Arts. It was closed (which we knew) but was interesting to look at. We ended the evening with a Cambodian dinner in the Mission. We had never had Cambodian before, but we loved it. Probably our second best meal of the trip — a grip that really didn’t have bad meals.
On 4/9, we rented a car to head out of town. But first, we had our second breakfast at the Pancake House. We drove across the Golden Gate Bridge (the plan had been to walk it, but I think we did OK without it). We drove through to Sonoma to Armstrong Nature Preserve. This was a good place to see the redwoods without driving all the way to the National Park. We stopped for a wine tasting in Sonoma. Neither of us our big wine drinkers, so this was mainly a perfunctory thing that we can now say we’ve done. We drove on to Berkeley — the college town’s college town, an I am a sucker for a college town. Not much to say, we only spent a few hours there. Walked around some, saw a homeless kid with his Venmo handle on his sign. We then drove on to Oakland for dinner. This time we went Peruvian and it was probably our best meal of the trip. ceviche, empanadas and a couple of desserts.
On 4/10, we had our third breakfast at the Pancake House and flew home.
It was a really good trip. The weather was perfect (a rarity in the bay area), the food was excellent and a couple of massages.