Yes, We’re Going To San Francisco, We Can’t Wear, Flowers In Our Hair!!

This crow sat atop a church and 'cawed' at myself & Ric. Everytime we talked to it, it 'cawed' back & was very Stephen King like!!


We had a midday flight to San Fran and, unlike New Orleans, we left with plenty of time and even did it via the Subway. By this time Ric was starting to feel the onset of “The Sickness”… When we got to JFK our flight had been delayed by an hour, nothing too bad… As we were going through Security (my first flight with no SSSS search in ages!!) our flight was delayed a further half hour & then, just because they could, they delayed us a further 2 hours!! Great!! No other flights were being delayed & there was no snow!!

A photo to try & capture the 'steepness' of San Fran.

Eventually 1530 rolled around and we finally got underway. Apparently our plane had been parked at another airport so they had to fly the pilots over to collect it & when they got there it wasn’t ready to go, as in it wasn’t refuelled & then when they did get it to JFK they had to give it a full clean and then load everything on board!! Beh!

When we did arrive @ San Fran, once again we took the public transport option (BART) to the inner city. At this point I have to mention, as I have previously, how crap Melbourne’s Airport is too access. You’re only two options are to pay a minimum of $50 by taxi to get anywhere near the CBD - especially where Backpackers are concerned - or pay the damned Skybus (I hate them, I don’t know why, I’ve never used them, I just hate them!!) $15 to take you to Spencer St Station (I refuse to call it Southern Cross!) with no other stops possible & then you have to pay for another ticket to commence PT transport!! It’s so crap! Even Brisbane has a train to their airport!! In New York it cost Ric & I $2 for an hour or so journey to get to the Air Train & then it cost us a further $5 to get to our Terminal. San Fran was $5.50 for an hour ride to the stop nearest our Hostel. With BART, each stop down the line adds approx 10-20c to your ticket. Why is Melbourne so crap…?

One of San Fran's buses that operates much like a tram & has zero emmissions.. it still uses electricity though but tis pretty cool!

Ah, nothing like a quick vent!! Now I’d seen movies that featured San Fran as a backdrop & knew that parts of it were quite steep & hilly. Wrong! The whole fricking town is like that!! It’s crazy! The Hostel wasn’t that far away from BART but it just happened to be uphill the entire way! In hindsight (& yes, it’s a bitch) we should have caught a cab as the ascent to our Hostel, combined with 3.5hr delay had knocked Ric for 6. He pretty much crashed straight away, leaving me to go out and find a pretty decent Thai dinner.

The classic Trolley Car - we never rode it but had ideas of hanging out the side as it went down the hills!!

The next few days had the potential to suck - especially as this was a brand new town for both of us - & I didn’t want to go out exploring too far without Ric. As much as I wished Ric a speedy recovery it was also actually nice to have a couple of days of stop time. I went and saw a movie, sat in cafes & read newspapers (San Fran Chronicle & New York Times are by far the best world papers I’ve found) & just unwound & relaxed. Even though I wasn’t feeling stressed about anything, it was a great way to get rid of the built up tension of the past couple of months & let the muscles truly kick back after a pretty busy touring schedule.

Giz & 'Gossy' - named after Zoe Goss, a female Aus Cricketer. They were introduced on the Pub Crawl.

Ric started getting out & about & we had a few decent meals around our area. We also went & saw “No Country For Old Men”, it was a pretty good flick. I hadn’t read the book it was adapted from but from reviews I’d read, the movie was different to what I’d envisaged, which was fine.

Aard & myself!

Ric was was pretty tired come early/late evening which left me to attend the Hostel organised Pub Crawl alone!! It was a pretty fun evening. As I was by myself, it took a couple of beers before the pre-formed groups broke up and were ready to receive a bald Aussie with a really sexy side burns & beard combination!! There were actually a few Aussies on the Crawl but they were ya tru blue, stubbie & wife beater wearing yobbos! Fly the flag boys, fly the flag!! There was also a nice Aussie, Gav who was 5 weeks in to a 2.5yr plan of OS travel & living. He was to commence his 1st ‘living’ stint in London in about 3 weeks. He was pretty cool. There was also Tell from Belgium, who became my instant friend when he saw me drinking Chimmay (a Belgium beer), Aard from Sweden, who was one of the tallest people I’ve ever met, Tosh from Japan - “You no be able to say me name. Me Tosh.” & Steph from Virginia, USA who had actually met Ric earlier in the day! I was at the bar ordering a round & she asked an Aussie if he had a brother called Ric, to which I replied I did!!

Myself & Tell.

A view of San Fran from 'Vertical Park'.

The following day we headed down to Haight/Ashbury which is kinda like a cross between Brunswick St & Sydney Road. A whole bunch of cafes & second hand clothes stores, with new music & trendy new clothes thrown into the mix. We found a great café that served me prob one of the best breakfasts I’ve ever had - Huevo Rancheros, or Ranch Eggs! Dan had told me about this dish but I had yet to find it anywhere in the US. Now was my time to dine! It was gold - basically a flour tortilla, folded over but filled with layers of black beans, egg, meat, a tomato salsa, cheese & then covered with a great, white ranch sauce. The hash browns that it came with were the best I’ve eaten, & I do love my hash browns! They were homemade & nice & creamy. The coffee was also the best yet encountered in the US - I had 2 medium (read massive) soy lattes.

Our first glimpse of the Golden Gate from 'Vertical Park'.


After food we just walked the length of the street & at the far end was Golden Gate Park - which we expected to be quite ‘fancy’ as it bore the name of the bridge…. Nope! All run down & over grown. This could have something to do with the fact that pretty much everyone down that end of the street was offering to sell you “the stuff”! “Are you gonna ask the question or is he..?” “Come on man, it’s nice & you got the whole night ahead of you!” & so on & so forth!! We then found, and the best way to describe it is, a really tall park!! It wasn’t horizontally designed, it was vertical! It was bizarre but the views from the top were fantastic and we caught our first glimpse of the Golden Gate. We had been talking to Steph & the plan was for us & her friend Lane to cycle across the bridge on Saturday. Ric & I then got all adventurous and, without any kind of map or asking for directions we walked the whole way home from Haight/Ashbury (we’d taxied it there)! It took us about an hour and fifteen, so at a guess it was about 6-7kms.

We were downstairs in the Hostel & we ran into Gav who was very kind and slung a couple of beers our way. Pretty soon we were off in search of a bar. We had a few rounds at one Ric & I had seen on our walk back & then we decided that we should venture forth into San Fran & find other watering holes. The first taxi we flagged down was exactly what we were looking for. A guy anywhere between 25-35 but had that ‘cool look’ of someone who’d be hanging out at The Espy, Prince Of Wales, The Retreat, Northcote Social Club - basically, he’d have his finger on the pulse and we’d be able to trust him with our query : “Where would you head to if you were heading out at 2130 on a Fri night?” 16th Avenue in The Mission was his choice & yes, he was correct. A crossroad that had multiple bars to choose from and he stopped & pointed out many and even gave us a basic blueprint of how to run the night. The only downside being that all bars shut at 2am!

A snapshot of the first bar Ric, Gav & myslef visited.

We only ended up visiting 2 bars in the end but it was a great night. Once again we met a few really decent people and once again, as in New York, I didn’t take any photos! D’oh! As we had done previously in the day, once we were ready to head home we ended up walking home! A bit more brave seeing as it was dark & our minds weren’t as clear as earlier on but we both made it home in one piece!!