Friday, October 25, 2013

road trip recap: san francisco, ca

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Oh, San Francisco :)  K was born and spent his childhood in a suburb of San Francisco, so the city has a special place in his heart and I planned the trip so we could spend his birthday there.  We booked an amazing studio apartment on AirBnB (our first experience using the site, and such a success!) and spent three days and nights exploring the city.  We arrived in the evening after our bike ride through wine country, got the keys from our host, and had some adventures in parking.  The apartment was so great that we decided to order a pizza and stay in that first night, and we walked down to the little main street in our neighborhood to get a couple of pies from Vega, which were delicious. Just as we finished eating a parking space opened up right outside our window, so K went sprinting down the street to get the car and move it (and we did not move it again after that).

The next morning we took a bus downtown, experiencing the Mission District in its full glory.  That's all I'll say about that except that we didn't last long on the bus, and ended up powerwalking for about 15 blocks into town.  We went down to the waterfront and then ventured into Chinatown for lunch at House of Nanking, which we found sort of by chance and turned out to be kind of famous (?), but was definitely amazing.  We were one of the only couples in the place, and the owner basically placed our order for us.  He wouldn't allow me to order a water, so I got a flowering tea that was really cool, and then K and I ended up ordering the same thing so he told us he would make something else and we would just share both dishes. (I kind of like to be bossed around at restaurants--I'm so indecisive sometimes I wish I didn't have any choices.)  Anyway, it was all delicious and I was really happy we went there.

With newfound energy after lunch we walked up through Russian Hill, past the crooked street (which I remembered from the last time I was in SF), and down to Fisherman's Wharf, stopping at a truffle shop along the way to get treats for later.  We briefly walked around the wharf and then just got in line for the trolley and took it all the way back downtown (SO FUN).  We decided to hang off the sides, which was awesome for us but perhaps not so awesome for everyone sitting inside.  That was definitely a highlight--at times the ride was like a rollercoaster on those steep San Francisco streets!  We got some groceries at Whole Foods and took a cab back to our apartment (we were exhausted).

The next day was K's birthday, so we had planned to go to a Giants game.  We took the BART downtown and made our way over to the ballpark, where K got a Giants shirt and we settled in to watch the game (and eat overpriced stadium food--sausage for him, garlic fries for me).  It was not a very exciting game--the  Mets were basically destroying the Giants from the very start, so we ended up leaving during the 7th inning stretch and going downtown to do some shopping (K bought a suit!). We took the BART back to our apartment and got ready for our 7:30 dinner reservation at Vega (I know, I know, a great food city like San Fran and we went to the same place twice--but it was yummy and close!).  I'll be frank, the service was TERRIBLE.  We had a reservation but were still stuck waiting outside for about 45 minutes past our reservation time, and when we were finally seated we were ignored for long enough that we walked out (even after all that waiting!).  I'm glad we stayed, however, because the food was worth the wait (and it was 1/2 off wine night, so we were able to splurge on a nice bottle like we would normally never do).  Because we'd waited so long, dessert was on the house, which was also nice, and we didn't feel bad about taking our sweet time eating and enjoying the restaurant atmosphere.  It was the perfect way to end our stay.

1 comment:

  1. lovely pics and beautiful eyes :;)

    http://sbr-fashion-fashion.blogspot.com/

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