Julie’s Birthday in San Francisco

Another year older and another memorable celebration. This year John surprised me with a 3 night getaway in San Francisco – he’s such a darling! It was a wonderful break from the Houston heat – in fact SF was actually quite cold and on a couple of occasions we actually wore our beanies and gloves!

We had a great day on Saturday with our friend Tina who is now living in San Jose (about an hour SE of SF). Some of you may have met Tina when she visited us in Adelaide a few years ago (2003 I think). She is from Germany and was backpacking around Australia during her gap year when we met her on the Gold Coast (we were holidaying with Josh). Since then we have kept in contact and actually caught up with her again during a visit to London in 2005 and then again in Prague in 2007. Tina had some very exciting news to share with us – she is now married to an American man, Charlie. They recently decided to fly to Las Vegas and have a wedding. Unfortunately we didn’t get to meet Charlie as he was in Taiwan on business but we saw the photos and he is really cute!!

We went on a ‘movie tour’ which also took in all the sights of San Francisco. It was such fun – we got to see Mrs. Doubtfire’s house, the Victorian homes from the TV show Full House, and scenes from 60 movies (including Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, The Birds, The Rock, Vertigo, The Presidio & Dirty Harry). Did you know that over 600 movies have been filmed in San Francisco? Amazing eh!

After the tour we ate lunch at Fisherman’s Wharf overlooking the Bay and watched all the yachts sail by……

We walked through Chinatown and bought some deliciously juicy fruit and then finished the day with Tina at a wonderful restaurant called Café Gratitude. This is a raw vegan restaurant and one that we have heard so much about so definitely was a highlight of the trip.

On Sunday we caught a bus down to Fisherman’s Wharf and then walked along Chrissy Field (another location from Mrs. Doubtfire) to the Golden Gate Bridge. Good thing we were rugged up ‘cos it was really windy and cold. Great for the sailing regatta happening on the water next to us but a little chilly for our walk. We walked across the bridge, over and back – amazing views and a great experience. Lots of fog around the place – apparently very common in summer and often winter is warmer – work that one out!!

We then made our way down to Pier 33 to join our tour over to Alcatraz. Really interesting and so glad I never had to spend any time there as an inmate – the cells were very cold and uncaring. The view however across to San Francisco is absolutely amazing – The Rock certainly is prime real estate. There was a sign there which stated - "If you break the rules, you go to prison. If you break the prison rules, you go to Alcatraz".

So I guess the caliber of tenant was very seedy……..

Monday morning I woke to a delicious birthday breakfast in bed – definitely a great way to start the day! We spent the morning walking around Union Square in downtown and then caught a cable car down to the bay. Quite amazing how the cable car makes its way up and down those extremely hilly streets – such a contrast to the very flat city of Houston.

All too soon it was time to head out to the airport and fly south into the heat. San Francisco was fabulous. We tried to see as much as we could however time ran out before crossing everything off our list. Of course that just means we have to return one day......