Blamblog - Brett Lamb's Blog

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Week in San Francisco

Here are a few more pics from our trip to San Francisco ...

The view of the city from across the bay (taken after we walked across the Golden Gate Bridge).

That was the day we met up with Lynette. We had lunch in the Haight-Ashbury district and were serenaded by buskers ... buskers with horns! Horns and accordions.

The 'counter-culture' style of San Francisco is kind of funny, especially considering how expensive the city is. On one of our first days there, we saw a crowd of stinking, dirty, unshaved hippies lined up on the street and we thought they were trying to get tickets for a concert but it turned out they were waiting for the iPhone. Okay, if you're lining up for a whole day to buy a $500 phone, I don't think you should be dressing like Che Guevara.

Despite being one of the more 'liberal' cities in the US, it's still a bit more uptight that we're used to. Maybe it's all that money. There were lots of little culture shock moments when the Americans displayed their trademark tenseness ... such as when we were asked to preclear our credit card before ordering dinner at a greasy pub on our first night. One of our favourites was the talking crosswalk advising us that cars might not stop. Yeah, but they might. We were left shaking our heads because we're from Toronto and we're the ones who are supposed to be uptight ... dude!"

The city is known for its cable cars (left), but they also run old PCC cars (above) on a semi-touristy streetcar line.

That line runs along the city's waterfront where an elevated highway used to sit until it was damaged in an earthquake. They tore down the expressway and replaced it with a beautiful boulevard. It's similar to what we've got with the Gardiner expressway here in Toronto ...

... so, I guess we need an earthquake. Mayor Miller seems to have completely forgot about expressway removal ... he's not turning out to be the 'quake' we're looking for.

We stayed at a well-located hotel (above), right in the heart of the city, a few steps from Chinatown (left).

If you visit, the only thing you might want to be wary of are those Napa Valley Wine tours. The one we went on was a money-sucking letdown. Our guide started us off on the wrong foot by announcing that everyone on the tour from Texas was lucky because -- unlike California -- their state knew how to apply the death penalty. Remember the scene in Star Trek: Whales when Bones calls the 80s-era San Francisco doctors, "barbaric"? Exactly.

At one winery, we were taken on a discount "tour" (a $30 value!) that consisted of standing at the bottom of some stairs staring at some wine vats and then looking at the bottling floor for five minutes. Our guide ... er, ambassador ... on that portion was a jokster buffoon who, when asked how many bottles the winery produced per year, said, "That's not my area of expertise!"

A $30 value.

We had a great time in San Francisco, it's a beautiful city. Go visit.

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