Photo updates (lots of good one’s today): http://www.flickr.com/photos/tibes/show/

I got up a bit later today to try and get a little more sleep. I had a shower and went and grabbed another bagel breakfast, then returned to the hotel room to pack up all my things. After packing I did a once, and then a twice over the hotel room to make sure I collected everything and then said goodbye to the smoke smell forever. I wheeled my luggage through to the hotel lobby and checked out. I then got them to store my luggage for a few hours so I could go out and do some more touristing.

The weather was looking much better so I’d put together a plan to do the Golden Gate bridge ride, and also check out Lombard St (the “world’s crooked-est street”) on the way to the Wharf. Lombard St has a total of 8 “switch-backs” (ie. sharp bends to avoid a steeper descent) which makes it a quite a sight to behold. It’s only for the section of the street between Hyde and Leavenworth streets, which happens to be only a few blocks from my hotel on the way to the Wharf where I planned to hire the bikes. I walked a different way also, so this made for a few other photo ops on the way. By the time I made it to the top of the hill at Lombard St, my legs were definitely feeling the abuse from the past few days, which didn’t bode well for the impending bike ride.

It’s impossible to miss the top of Lombard St - just look for the crowd of tourists being narrowly avoided by the passing traffic and cable cars. The crooked street is great to see, but the view down Hyde St and out to sea is also fantastic… Alcatraz island is framed perfectly by the buildings on either side of the street, and the wharf and boats and all visible in the mid-ground. Couple that with cable cars passing up and down the street and it’s quite a picture postcard spot.

It’s impossible to show in a photograph just how damn hilly and steep this area of San Francisco is. Standing on the wall at the top of Lombard St and taking photos, I could see across the whole city, and the ground just disappears from underneath your feet. It’s quite a giddy experience. Lombard St looks much more impressive, photographically at least, from the bottoms, so I made my way to the bottom of the street and took some shots of the cars coming down. I don’t think locals would ever use the street to get around, it’s just too impractical, but there’s a constant stream of taxi’s and tourist cars that fill the street almost all the time.

I then made my way back down to the Wharf and grabbed a drink for the bike ride before going over and hiring a bike for the day. It’s a very slick operation, they even give you a ferry ticket to use so you don’t have to buy one yourself, and give exact directions where to ride, which go in one ear, and then immediately out the other. Fortunately they also draw some little arrows on your map to remind you where to go when you arrive there. The trail down to the bridge takes you along Fisherman’s Wharf and then to Fort Mason (areas I’d walked through on Sunday). Following that you go along a bike path which ends up being quite rustic (see the pictures along the dirt track with the fence). It’s really quite a beautiful ride, and you could forget that you’re only a minute away from a bustling city. There’s plenty of other riders coming along the tracks so it’s pretty hard to get lost. I stopped at quite a few points along the way to take some pictures and grab some water.

The track goes all the way to the bottom of the Golden Gate. When I got there I couldn’t believe that there were people surfing in the water (which must have been freezing), under the bridge, only a few meters away from jagged rocks. I wish I had a longer lens so I could have taken some better pictures of the surfers under the bridge - quite a unique sight. From there you back track a little and ride up a steep hill, followed by another steep hill, and then another. You basically have to go from the sea level to the bridge level, so it’s unavoidable. There are more photo ops on the way up.

Once at the top you then get to ride along the bridge, dodging tourists as you go. This provides beautiful views of the city and surrounding area and the sudden realisation of the just how damn big the bridge is. It takes quite a while to ride or walk across (but this includes time for stopping and gawking, and avoiding all the other people on the pathway). On the other side you end up at “Vista Point”, an appropriately named spot which sports some fantastic views back across the bridge and to San Francisco. There’s heaps of tourists down here, walked, cycled and bused in from all over. It feels a little commercial (kinda like the Blue Mountains spots I went to a couple of years ago), so I didn’t stick around too long. From here you have a long down hill ride (after the previous exertion this is welcome) into Sausalito a smaller town on the other side of the bay.

The first thing I was reminded of when I rolled into Sausalito was The Goonies. It LOVED the vibe of the place. All the houses are built up hill, almost on top of each other. The architecture is old, with steepled roofs and lots of bay windows, verandah’s etc. Couple this with an overcast day in a sleepy, sea side town and it’s a really charming place. I reckon I could probably live here. If I were to come to the San Francisco area again, I’d probably book a hotel in Sausalito. It’s the perfect place to relax and the city is only 15 minute ferry ride away.

I skipped the next ferry and locked up my bike at the dock instead. I spent some time walking down the main street of town (picked up some postcards for Teresa, if she’s reading this… see I didn’t forget!) and then grabbed some fish and chips (well fish, shrimp, chips and salad) and took them down to the coast to eat them. Some large seagulls eyed me off but remained mostly behaved. I then grabbed the next ferry home and returned my bike to the rental place at the dock. By this stage it was getting quite chilly (as in worst winter days in Melbourne sort of chilly). I was pretty tired by now so I caught the Powell St cable car down to Union Square and then walked back to my hotel along Geary St. This is still a 20+ minute walk, but doesn’t involve 40 minutes of hills I’d otherwise be subjected to.

I grab my bags from the hotel, and repeat the exact same walk in reverse to get down to the BART station. To get to San Jose you have to take CalTrain, which is separate to the BART. The problem is the Caltrain station is quite a way from central San Francisco, and I’m not game to walk it with luggage, so I planned to take BART through to Millbrae where you can transfer to CalTrain. Even then I have the 20 minute walk to BART. It’s hard to hail cabs here, they’re not everywhere waiting for fares like in New York. Usually they’re occupied when you see them, and most of them don’t “sit” at locations.

I get to BART and travel to Millbrae (actually the station before, I forget what it’s called for the transfer), this takes about 40 minutes. The CalTrain train turns up fairly quickly and I settle down for the hour long ride to San Jose. The train driver seems overly happy about being a train driver making jokes at each stop, which is nice to see for a change. I get to see a bit more of the “burbs” of the bay area out the window on the way. It’s almost dark by the time we reach San Jose, and I’d decided that it wasn’t worth considering walking the distance to the hotel, which I estimate to be about 6-7 kms. Luckily there’s a taxi waiting at the station when I get there. San Jose seems like a flatter, “newer” city which has grown up around commerical business rather than any long standing industry. Because of that there isn’t much in the way of infrastructure, like trains, subways etc. It reminds me a little of Tampa in terms of it’s feeling.

I get to the Hyatt finally, manage to tip to the taxi driver without making an ass of myself and get my room all without incident. The hotel is really nice with a lagoon like central area with the pool etc. It has a fitness club (gym) and all the amenties you’d expect. Hey, for free, how could I complain anyhow? I went down to the hotel restaurant to grab something to eat. Might I add, this is the first time I’ve dined in a fine restaurant alone. I don’t think I’ll do so again (at least not without some reading material or something to do)… it’s quite a strange experience. The waiter asked me if I’d like olive oil, to which I (automatically) replied, “yes”. I wasn’t sure what to expected and when I tipped it onto a plate and then poured on some vinegar I was a little confused. I dipped some bread in it and hoped that was the right thing to do.

I think I messed up the tip when I paid for the meal, but I was so tired I couldn’t calculate 15% correctly and add it to the total. Hopefully they’ll get over it.