We arrived at the airport Thursday morning to find our flight had been delayed because, according to Delta, there was too much air traffic heading to the west coast right then. (Really?) When we finally boarded, I found my exit row window looking somewhat less-than-safe, with something that looked like medical tape holding it in place. That made me a little nervous.

I dozed on and off and worked on my knitting, then Matt and I had the very delicious sandwiches we’d packed for the trip, because now we are THOSE PEOPLE.

We arrived only a little late in San Francisco, and headed to the information booth to by transit passes. April picked us up outside, and took us to lunch at Zante Pizza. We ordered a vegetarian Indian pizza and Indian beers, and life was very good.

April drove us to our hotel, the Executive Hotel Vintage Court, and we checked in and dropped off our bags. I wasn’t sure what the hotel would be like, but it ended up being much nicer than I’d expected. We then ran back down to where April was waiting, and headed toward Telegraph Hill to see Coit Tower. I’d been there on both previous visits, and I wasn’t going to ruin a good streak.

The sky was fairly clear, so we could see almost everything except for the Golden Gate Bridge.

After we finished taking in the scenery, April drove us down to Fisherman’s Wharf and dropped us off to go be tourists. We walked down by the little beach, then headed toward the historic ship dock. The national park was closing down for the day, but the visitor center was open, so we stopped in to see the museum. Further down the wharf, we noticed the Musee Mecanique, and decided to go in and see what it was about. It was FANTASTIC, and free!

All the machines took quarters, so I dug some out of my purse and we tried some of them. In the back, they had a collection of old video games, as well as skee-ball and whack-a-mole. I wished I had way more quarters than I did.

We decided to walk down the Embarcadero toward the Ferry Building, which was about a mile and a half a way. We encountered the same pedicab guy three or four times, and he tried unsuccessfully to convince us to hop in each time. It’s not really a vacation if there isn’t a ton of walking. Along the way, we passed the Alcatraz ferry dock, and the huge complex they were building for the America’s Cup in 2013.

We finally reached the Ferry Building Marketplace, and found it full of awesome restaurants and shops (I was really excited to see Cowgirl Creamery’s outpost there). There were a bunch of little places with carry-out, and some full-service restaurants with outdoor patios facing the bay. We weren’t hungry at the time, but I made note of the empanada cart.

Matt’s destination of choice was Boccalone, which sold two things: pork products and water. He lamented not being able to carry on gigantic hunks of meat, and settled on some smaller packaged bits instead, and also a t-shirt.

We got a couple glasses of water and went to go sit and examine our maps to figure out where to go next. We weren’t ready for dinner, but it seemed like a pretty good time for beer. I didn’t see anything great on the map, so we decided to just walk for a while and see what we could find. While we walked into the financial district, I searched around for beer bars and finally noticed the Rogue Brewpub on the map. PERFECT.

I quickly discovered just how excellent Google’s transit directions are. We found our way to a bus stop, and the bus arrived right when Google said it would. We fired up our transit passes and hopped on. Within a few stops, the bus became packed to the point of preventing excess breathing. I kept checking the map as it counted the stops along the way, but still managed to miss it by one. We hopped off and walked back a block to the brewpub.

We sampled some of their excellent beers and hung out for a while, trying to decide whether we wanted to have dinner there or elsewhere. After a while, it became apparently that they were setting up for trivia or bingo, so we decided to go somewhere else. Matt researched a couple recommendations, and we decided to try Comstock Saloon, which was less than half a mile away in North Beach.

It turned out to be a very good choice for dinner. They had a great cocktail menu, and our entrees were excellent, not to mention a huge step up from what we’d have found at the brewpub. (My gnocchi with mushrooms and sunchokes made me very happy.) Matt pointed out the gutter running along the front of the bar beneath the stools; according to David Wondrich, that used to be so you didn’t have to leave your spot to go pee. REALLY.

Since we had to walk through Chinatown to get to our hotel anyway, we decided to seek out the notorious Red’s Place. We found it down the end of an alley, and walked in to find the bartender and one person sitting at the bar. We assumed by the way he was talking to the bartender that he worked there, but no… he was just in it for the long haul.

I decided to go with their special, a shot of Jameson and a Budweiser for $7. Matt wanted a beer upgrade, so he asked for an Anchor Steam. The bartender asked if he wanted the last of their Christmas release (it seemed a little early, but whatever), so he took that. Because of that, she decided it was time to celebrate Christmas in the bar, and went to put Christmas music on the jukebox.

Two women and a man came in a little later and said they were celebrating one of the ladies’ birthdays, but she looked not very happy about it. When we finished our drinks, we inquired about the scary-looking bottles on the back bar. They were both Chinese whiskies, and the bartender described the one in the red bottle as being kind of like Jagermeister, but made from sour apples. The other one, which looked like something you’d put in an engine, she said was best avoided. We believed her, and got a shot of the first one instead. It was surprisingly delicious.

Much as we’d have liked to spend our night and possibly the rest of our trip at Red’s Place, we knew better. We decided to go elsewhere, and promised ourselves that we would bring Steve and Colleen there. It was an easy walk from our hotel, after all.

We headed toward the financial district, and found a place called Rickhouse that we’d seen listed in Foursquare as having a giant whiskey collection. That was no joke:

The place was crowded, but we found a spot at a barrel next to the bar where we could order. I got a Sazerac and asked the bartender to make it with really good rye, because I had faith in their selections. After a while a couple of bar stools opened up, so we moved there and examined the menu. I had a corpse reviver next, and we talked to the bartender for a while. Then we decided it was probably time to head back to our hotel, since our friends would be arriving the next morning.

In preparation, we stopped at a corner store to pick up something to bring to their hotel room. I was going for champagne, but Matt saw the Moscato and had to get that instead. GAG. We also picked up a couple of cans of Tecate for the room, and walked back up the gigantic hill to our hotel.

Matt and I got up Friday morning and walked the half-block up to the cable car stop on Powell Street. We were about six blocks up the giant hill from the turnaround, so it was already pretty full when we got on. We got seats a bit later, and I discovered it’s actually easier to stand on the cable car than try to keep from sliding around too much on the wooden seats.

We rode all the way down to Fisherman’s Wharf, and went into the Buena Vista Cafe for Irish coffees. If there were tourist badges for San Francisco, we would have earned at least six of them just in that half-hour.

The bartenders were a couple of old guys with fancy mustaches and ties, and they made the coffees 12 or so at a time, tossing a sugar cube accurately into each one from an impressive distance. We sat at the bar to enjoy the show, but couldn’t get breakfast there since they didn’t serve at the bar. That was ok, because the menu looked overpriced and underinspired.

So we went to In-N-Out Burger instead. As usual, there was a line out the door, and the food was great. While we were eating, Colleen texted to say their plane had landed at SFO. We wandered in and out of a few shops at Fisherman’s Wharf, then headed back to the cable car stop to ride back to our hotel.

We stopped into our room, grabbed the bottle of Moscato, and walked the couple of blocks to their hotel. The Triton was VERY VERY trendy, and the walls were covered with the text of “On The Road”. I couldn’t stop staring at it, so I doubt I could have slept there. We enjoyed our delicious Moscato, by which I mean we tolerated it, and then we set off in search of lunch. (In-N-Out was… brunch. Yeah.)

We walked through Chinatown, stopping to take a photo of Red’s Place along the way. I wouldn’t want to forget the most awesome bar in the world.

One of the first restaurants we passed in North Beach, Giordano Brothers, had a sign out front saying they served Pittsburgh food. I didn’t really know what that meant, but Steve and Colleen were more than excited to show us, having both lived there. We got a table and ordered beers.

This is what Pittsburgh food looks like:

They even had two vegetarian versions of the gigantic sandwich with fries on it. (How we managed to do anything after eating lunch, I will never know.) While we were there, we showed them our plans for Saturday night, which we’d learned about at the museum at Fisherman’s Wharf.

(I also gave Colleen Drunk Cat, which I’d torn out of Skymall. It was hard to stop looking at it.)

After our late lunch, it was time to head to our ferry. We walked the mile to the Ferry Building, and passed through to see all the shops again. On the far end, we found the stop for our ferry to Alameda. While we waited there, Matt and Steve started writing their own sea shanties, so that they could present them at the shanty sing-along Saturday night.

We boarded the boat and got a table. The shanties continued, most of them about “a ferry to Old Alameda”. And the rhymes… well, they were pushing it a little. The ferry took us into the channel between Alameda and Oakland, which is very industrial and full of gigantic container ships. We noticed a building with “Hangar One” on it, and knew that was where we were headed from the dock. The ferry landed at Alameda Main Street, and we got off with a bunch of commuters who were all headed to the park-and-ride.

We were following directions on the St George Spirits website, which said their building was a half-mile walk from the ferry docks. From what we’d seen arriving, it appeared to be a lot farther away, but at least we knew what direction to go. (According to Google Maps, it’s actually exactly a mile.) We headed off that way, walking through semi-deserted dirt parking lots along the shipping channel because there weren’t any sidewalks. There weren’t many people, either; there were a few people fishing, and evidence of someone’s sleeping quarters inside a giant bush. There was a dog park with a few dogs laying down, not running.

The entire place was so surreal that we decided we were probably going to die. I took a picture in the hopes that someone would eventually find my camera and be able to recreate the moments leading up to our murder.

Then there were no people, and then road took a sharp left turn into a naval base. That definitely didn’t seem like somewhere we wanted to walk, but it was the only option, and we knew St George’s was on the other side of it.

We saw a man standing at the gate to the base, so we got more and more nervous as we neared him. Once we got up close, we saw that he was just a guy standing and smoking there, even though there was really nowhere nearby for him to have come from. We avoided him and passed through the gates (where someone had spray-painted HELP on the window), and realized that the base was obviously no longer in use.

Just past the gates, there was a baseball diamond with a group of men playing something resembling softball, only there were at least three people on each base, including behind home plate. (There were also a ton of geese hanging around in the outfield.) There was gym that seemed to still be in use, and farther along on the right, a skate park with a few teenagers. The entire left side of the street was empty barracks in varying states of abandonment. Some of the windows were boarded up, some were broken, and some had falling-down curtains, which really added to the ambiance. We were positive we were going to die.

Finally we got to the end of the street and saw the giant warehouse with St George’s logo on it. We had to go around the back to get in, but we were reassured once we saw cars in the parking lot. Their view is pretty excellent, too, looking out over the old airstrips toward San Francisco:

We went inside and checked in for our tour, which we were very early for. We hung out in the lobby, just being happy to have survived. There were a bunch of people there doing tastings, and the place was still decorated for Halloween. It seemed appropriate.

After a while, everyone showed up for the tour and we headed into the distillery. We’ve seen a lot of them, but it was pretty awesome to hear about their approach… they use all-natural ingredients, which is a big change from a lot of the flavored vodka makers.

In the back near the bourbon barrels, there’s a shark. The guy leading the tour explained that it’s the same shark that ate Samuel L Jackson in Deep Blue Sea, and that the employees liked to ride it around the building sometimes.

After the tour, it was time for the tasting. We all lined up at the bar and sampled about a million of their offerings. The infused vodkas were legitimately great, too.

Then it was time to head back to the ferry. We were the only ones leaving there on foot, of course, and this time it was dark. We didn’t see any evidence of haunting or murderers in the empty barracks, but there were still people at the skate park in the dark. We made it out of the base, and walked back through the giant parking lot again. There was at least one car parked there with completely fogged-over windows. (When I think romance, I think of the shipping channel in Alameda.)

We waited on the dock for the ferry, which only took about 5 minutes to arrive. A couple people got off and headed to their cars. I asked the guy who was taking tickets if the boat went to Oakland first before heading back to San Francisco, and he became very confused. He told us the boat wasn’t going to San Francisco, which made us a little nervous. We didn’t want to be stuck in Alameda, but we really didn’t want to be stranded in Oakland, either. He finally told us to go talk to the guy on the boat, so we went down there and boarded.

The guy explained that yes, they did stop in Oakland and then headed back to San Francisco. The other guy didn’t speak very good English, so he must have misunderstood the question. We got margaritas from the bar, and grabbed a table. There were only a couple other people on the boat at that point, and by the time we landed at the last stop on Fisherman’s Wharf, we were the only people on the ferry.

We needed dinner, stat, which was kind of unfortunate since we were in the most crappy-tourist-restaurant-laden part of town. We walked down the Embarcadero looking at menus, and finally found a seafood restaurant that looked sufficient. There was a guitar guy playing in the mostly-crowded bar area, but the restaurant was nearly empty.

We looked over the menu, and everything was crazily overpriced. Our server brought a basket of rolls, so we ate those and ordered beer and appetizers rather than a full dinner. We sat there talking about a building Steve had learned was a sex club in Seattle, while a creepy guy sitting by himself at a nearby table didn’t bother disguising the fact that he was listening to our entire conversation. We paid up and headed to the bus stop to ride to the Tonga Room, figuring we could probably get more food there.

Matt and I knew what the interior of the Tonga Room looked like, and that it was inside a hotel, but we didn’t realize it was inside the Fairmont Hotel. (We also didn’t realize that the three-block walk from the bus stop would be up an insanely steep hill.) We were shocked at the fanciness of everything in the lobby. There was a sign for the Tonga Room pointing downstairs, so we headed that way and found the entrance at the very back of the building. It looked alarmingly like a club entrance in Vegas.

We were also a little shocked at the $7 cover and the fact that it was incredibly busy that early in the night, but we ended up at a table right between the bar and the dance floor, where we had a great view of the disaster unfolding around us.

First of all, there was this lady sleeping at the table next to us. She spend about 20 minutes like that, and then went and danced the rest of the night after the bouncer woke her.

There was a large group of people taking up most of the bar area and dance floor (which was also packed), and they were all clearly on the wealthier end of the spectrum. After overhearing bathroom conversations between some of them, we figured out that it was probably the most expensive rehearsal dinner event of all time. It seemed like probably half the people in the room knew each other, and some of them were in various stages of hilarious drunkenness. Colleen said there was even a girl crying on the far end of the bar.

The mai tais were way too sweet, but the scorpion bowl was awesome:

In the middle of the room, there’s a pool (the old hotel swimming pool, as a matter of fact) with a barge floating in it. That’s where the cover band plays. Every half hour or so, there’s fake thunder and light-flashing and it rains over the swimming pool, near the dance floor. That coupled with the pre-wedding spectacle going on around us made the entire thing really entertainingly surreal.

After our scorpion bowl, it was time to call it a night. I just wish we could have seen the aftermath the next day when all those people had to go to a wedding.

We had the best intentions of getting up Saturday morning to watch the Minnesota (us) – Michigan (Steve and Colleen) football game, but since it was at 9am and the only bars we knew would have it were far away, they decided to sleep in instead. I was up early, so I ‘watched’ it on my phone. Not that I really cared, because I knew exactly how it would end up. Our football team is godawful.

We met them at their hotel a bit later and rode the BART to the Mission for lunch at Pancho Villa. I was thrilled to find a tofu ranchero burrito on the menu. After a ton of food and a beer, we were ready to go be tourists. We rode back to where we’d come from, and walked to SFMOMA.

We only had 2 1/2 hours there, but we figured we’d see what we could. Our first stop was the rooftop patio, because it was gorgeous outside. It was kind of hard to leave there, actually.

We managed to see a pretty decent amount of the museum, including a really good Jasper Johns exhibition. We had a bit of time to hit up the gift shop for some souvenirs, and then decided it was time for beer. Luckily, there was a little brewpub called ThirstyBear right around the corner!

After a couple beers, we headed back to our respective hotels to change. Colleen and Steve came to meet us at our room, and we went to grab the town car they’d called using Uber. It was the first we’d heard of it, and the idea was indeed pretty awesome. Our driver took us over to the Japantown area, and dropped us off near State Bird Provisions.

We waited for a short time for our reservations, and got a table in back. We ordered beers, and our server explained how it worked: they had dim-sum-style carts going around the restaurant, and you could also order a few items off the menu, if you wished. We decided to wait for the carts.

The food was really impressive, but the carts were very low on the vegetarian offerings. We ended up ordering a couple things off the menu so I could have more dinner. All in all, though, it was great, and insanely popular. The line got a lot longer as we ate, and it was already late in the evening.

We walked over to Japantown mall in search of a beverage at a store that was just closing as we arrived. We decided to go check out a bar we’d seen on the way to the restaurant instead. When we got there we found a bouncer and a certain degree of fanciness involved, so we nixed that idea and went into a nearby pizza place for beers instead. We hung out there for a while watching sports, and then decided it was time to take them to the GREATEST BAR ON EARTH.

Colleen ordered another town car, and we had to chase him up the block because he had the location wrong. We got in and the whole car smelled like the driver’s really intense cologne. I said something about wanting water, so he told me to take a bottle from the back deck. I was happy to have it, but even the plastic was permeated with that smell. Amazing.

He dropped us at Red’s Place, where we got to introduce them to the joys of Chinese whiskey and the awesome jukebox.

Steve played a pretty amazing playlist, to the delight of some of the other customers. (It included “Call Me Maybe” and “Hey Jealousy”.) We decided it was finally time to leave when “Come Sail Away” came on, so we walked down the street in Chinatown singing it. (To the delight of some passers-by.) We were maybe a bit raucous, but then Chinatown was totally deserted. Nobody seemed to mind too much.

Sunday morning, we got up waaaaaaaay too early for my Chinese whiskey hangover, but Colleen and Steve were flying out and we wanted to see them before they left. We walked around the block and met them at Scala Bistro, which had an excellent breakfast.

Afterward, we said goodbye to them and went directly back to our hotel to sleep a while longer. When we got up the second time, I felt way better.

We walked down to Chinatown and caught a bus down to the Embarcadero. It dropped us across the street from the ferry dock for the Alcatraz cruises. We checked in and got in line for our boat, with about a million other people.

I had originally wanted to take the night tour, since I’d done that before and it was awesome. I quickly realized the benefits of the daytime trip, though, because of the views from the boat.

We landed on the island, got our ‘briefing’ from the guide, and all climbed the hill to the prison. We waited in line for headphones, then headed upstairs for the self-guided tour. (It’s really, really funny to watch how a giant group of people behaves when they’re all being led around by audio instructions. There’s a lot of standing and staring blankly.)

I feel like the tour may have been more extensive during the day, too. I don’t remember going outside at all on the night tour. Possibly there’s a “no, it’s way too cold” option. Anyway, the view was fantastic, as was the weather.

We got to visit solitary confinement, too:

The tour of the prison ends in the kitchen. They had a pretty interesting exhibit there about life after Alcatraz.

We turned in our headphones and went out to find the trails on the south side of the island.

The Agave trail was aptly-named. They should be making tequila there. Also, amazing views of the city!

We hurried back to the second-to-last ferry and stood in a really long line to board. We rode back to San Francisco, and crossed the Embarcadero to wait for the streetcar. (The same streetcar I’d almost been pickpocketed on before, thank you very much.) One streetcar passed without stopping, so full that limbs were sticking out all the windows. Another one came along 10 minutes later, in the same state of fullness. We attempted to board, but Matt noticed that they didn’t take cash. (Not that we could’ve gotten anywhere near the guy taking money, but whatever.) We decided to walk instead.

We headed back down toward the Ferry Building for a snack, because I had been thinking of the mushroom empanada stand for far too long. I got my empanada, and Matt got a meat cone from Boccalone:

We also stopped into the grocery store to get beers, and I asked the lady at the counter if we were allowed to drink them outside. She said yes, as long as they were decanted into something and/or kept in a bag. Since it was too early in the day to be drinking out of a bag, she gave us a couple plastic cups and pointed us in the direction of the best seats nearby.

We went out back and found a bench facing the bay. This guy noticed our food right away, and hung around watching us for a very long time:

We hung out enjoying the view for a while, and then once it started getting dark, decided to head over to Mission Chinese while it was still early. We’d heard they always had lines to get in, and we figured that would ensure us a table. We walked over to the BART station nearest the Ferry Building, and rode to the same stop as usual. (What we’d quickly realized is that the Mission is where San Francisco keeps all its best food.)

The place opened at 5, and we arrived shortly before 5:30 to find a line had already formed. There was a clipboard hanging out front with the menus, so we put our name down. There were probably 6 people ahead of us, and one of the hostesses said that the wait probably wouldn’t be very long. We stood around admiring the massive variety of people in the neighborhood, and finally my name was called 20-30 minutes later.

The place was worth the wait. We got beers, the vinegar peanuts, and I ordered the Thrice-Cooked Bacon vegetarian style. The tofu skin and little rice pancakes were amazing. Matt had the Ma Po Tofu, which he loved just as much.

April texted to see what we were up to, so I told her we would be heading her direction after dinner. We made arrangements to meet at Smuggler’s Cove. Matt and I headed back to the BART after dinner, and rode to the stop near city hall. On the map it didn’t look like the bar was that far (less than a mile, at least), but the neighborhood was weird and deserted. (It was mostly the municipal buildings, so that makes sense.) It turned into a mostly residential area, and we found the place in an unassuming location around the corner.

The main-level bar was closed, but the downstairs and loft were open. We went downstairs and found it just full to the point of there being no seats left (the place is extremely tiny). We ordered drinks at the bar, and admired the decor while we waited. Since we had just visited an original 60s-era tacky tiki bar, it was pretty excellent to get to hang out in the modern variety as well. (Note: the decoration is largely the same, it’s just the drinks that are a world apart.) The bartenders were fantastic, and their drink list was huge.

We took up a corner-standing spot and kept an eye out for seats while we waited for April. A group of three Russians, two men and a woman, came in and got drinks at the bar, but seemed very confused about the tiki concept… one of them just wanted a shot of Jack Daniels. They hung out on the couch surrounding the fish pond for a bit, then left disgustedly. I quickly grabbed the couch, and April showed up shortly afterward.

She noted that they had a drinking challenge, wherein you got a card with all their drinks on it and had to work your way through them, so we picked that up at the bar as well. After a while, a couple vacated a table around a barrel nearby, so we upgraded seating. That worked pretty well for a while until April and Matt went up to the bar to get drinks, and a couple showed up and asked if they were returning. I said yes, but offered to scoot over on the couch to give them some room. (People LOOOOVE communal seating in California. They’re friendlier than Midwesterners.) They took that space and more, basically taking over the table we were using. It was strange.

We had a couple more rounds there, and then it was time to head out for the night. It wasn’t very late, but that would make having brunch and running errands before our flight much easier the next day. We said goodbye to April, and walked back to our hotel.

I woke up in the middle of the night with a strange feeling in my head, and realized I was getting sick. It wasn’t horrible, but it was enough to make me wish I’d brought decongestants. (At least it had the decency to wait til our last day, too.)

We got up around 9, did most of our packing-up, and hopped on the BART back to the Mission. We got off at the same stop we’d already been at a few times, and headed over to the Pork Store on Valencia. I’d eaten at their Haight outpost a few times, and really wanted him to try it too.

We got a table on the sidewalk and ordered mimosas and brunch. It was a hell of a brunch:

It was gorgeous outside, too, which made the fact that we were leaving that afternoon a lot more painful.

After lunch, we rode back to Powell Street and headed up the hill toward our hotel. We still had a couple hours until we had to be back to the hotel, so we stopped into the recently-opened Uniqlo and did some shopping. We then swung by Walgreens for some Sudafed (which you can buy over the counter in California… apparently they don’t have a meth problem there?), the went to the hotel to finish packing and check out.

We left our bags with the doorman for a little while, and walked down to Chinatown.

We stopped into one store to pick up the panda vest that Colleen had picked out for Very, and then a couple others for last-minute souvenirs. I got an orange waving cat for my desk at work, because sometimes I need all the luck I can get.

Then it was time to head back to the hotel and get our bags. We rolled them down the giant hill to the BART station and rode to the airport. The airport was fairly quiet, and we were early enough that we had time to get lunch while waiting.

On the flight, I sat next to a really interesting (and very talkative lady) who lived on Lake of the Isles and talked about her travels all over the world, proving that it’s pretty hard to be rich. Not that we can really complain.

Our trip got off to a good start. We arrived at the airport early, and found the flight delayed an hour due to conditions in San Francisco. We boarded and discovered that we were on a brand new A330, with the new-plane smell and everything. The thrill of that realization wore off the second the captain came on the intercom to tell us that they weren’t quite ready to fly yet; there was still some paperwork that needed completing before SFO would allow them to land. A while later, he told us they were awaiting an engine check: they had to run the engines, shut them down, check for oil, and then start them up again. It would probably take another hour or so. People on the plane got a little uptight about that, but we were trapped. And I was a little concerned maybe they had just assembled the airplane right on the tarmac, and which case it hadn’t even been checked for airworthiness yet.

We passed the time arguing about whether the airplane left the planet when it flew. She said that the atmosphere was part of the planet, so technically no. I maintained that she was full of crap. An hour and a half later, we were flying. They passed out headphones and switched on the back-of-seat entertainment for free, to quell our collective crabbiness. Stephanie announced, ‘Dude! They totally pimped this ride!’ and started watching The Notebook, even though I told her I’d make fun of her if she started bawling over that movie again.

I didn’t want to be in-seat entertained because I was knitting, but I did switch on the map. Man, that map is awesome. It told me where I was flying. Like South Dakota and the corner of Wyoming and Utah. Finally California. It told me we were averaging 550mph, how far we had come, how far we had to go, and that it was -60 degrees outside. And then all of that again in metric, as if I cared. It showed the entire western hemisphere, in case we got hijacked to Venezuela. If it involved the Middle East, we were on our own.

We arrived in SF around noon, and took the AirTrain to the BART. Being the awesome travel planner that I am, our hotel was located about 20 steps from the BART station at Powell Street. We checked in and then wandered through the Metreon and Yerba Buena Gardens on our way to find us some Pad Thai.

After lunch, we took the trolley to Fisherman’s Wharf. I was so less-than-charmed with Fisherman’s Wharf the last time I was there than I had missed the sea lions, so I was on a mission to see them. They were awesome, as long as their smell wasn’t wafting in our direction. They reminded me of my cats. I even made a movie of them.

We wandered through Fisherman’s Wharf, down to Ghirardelli Square. I don’t really get the whole chocolate empire thing, but it seemed to be a big draw. For some reason, we had already managed to do a ton of walking, even though I swore I was going to lay off and take public transport as much as possible (I was still having trouble with my ankle from the 3day in September). So we hobbled over to the cable-car turnaround nearby and waited to go up Russian Hill, one of the steepest in the city. Last year, I climbed it. This year, I was riding.

We dismounted at Powell Street and walked through Chinatown on the way back to the hotel. It was getting cold, possibly even colder than in Minnesota. On the way back, we discovered that the hotel strike has just begun. The sound of bullhorns, whistles, and banging on overturned buckets was to become the soundtrack to our stay there, together with the much-more-charming ‘dingding!’ of the cable cars.

Back at the hotel, we put on warmer clothes and headed over to meet Jay for dinner at the ‘fake-meat Chinese place’ in the Tenderloin. The tamarind beef was so good, I considered replacing my usual fantasies with memories of dinner. Tired as hell, we made our way back to the hotel, weaving our way through street people and hotel strikers. I promptly passed out because I can sleep through anything; my sister stayed awake most of the night listening to cable cars (we were right above the Powell St turnaround), the resident street preacher, and sirens.

On our trip, I promised Stephanie she could sleep til 8. Saturday morning, I couldn’t sleep past 6, so I got up and went for coffee. I chose The Barbary Coast, figuring one couldn’t go wrong with a pirate-themed coffee shop. I was actually very wrong; there was nothing pirate about it but the prices.

I went back to the hotel to pester her awake, and we jumped on a bus to Haight-Ashbury, for breakfast at The Pork Store. How could a vegetarian not like the idea of a restaurant called The Pork Store? We got there early enough to avoid the lines at the un-greasy spoon. The server girls were awesome. So was the food; we split a veggie scramble with salsa and biscuits and veggie-gravy. Also, it must be noted that I love eating with people like my sister, who is not vegetarian but doesn’t mind eating that way at all.

After breakfast, the shops had not yet opened, so we went to wander around Golden Gate Park. We figured we’d go see the Japanese Tea Garden and the buffalo herd. But our map, it wasn’t quite accurate. It said that the scale changed past Divisadero, but didn’t say how much it changed. After walking what felt like 20 miles, we found a map that told us we were not even close to those sights, which were located near the other end of the park. Like, by the ocean. So we turned around and went back, and by the time we reached Haight Street and wove our way through the street people sleeping in the park, the shops had opened.

I found a Buddhist jewelry store and got myself a spinning prayer ring for my thumb. It had my favorite mantra on it, although I admit that reading Sanskrit is a personal failing. We stopped at one of my favorite stores in the world, no, the universe: Kidrobot. I fell in love with gloomy bears, although the last thing I need is a new collection. The girl behind the counter was so enthusiastic and loveable it was hard to leave. She told us to check out the reggae festival in the park (which we had wandered past on our trek), and the Love Parade.

Only SF could have an event called the Love Parade.

We went to more shops. The guy at Yak Pak insisted we go to the Love Parade. We said OK! in that we’re-totally-lying-just-to-make-you-happy kinda way. And bought our stuff and left.

With really good intentions about not walking so damn much and taking buses instead, we walked up and down the hills of Haight Street towards the Store for Working Pirates. We stopped at Flax Art, which is also on my top-ten list of best! stores! ever! We were both trying very hard to not spend a million dollars on our trip, being all newly budget-conscious and responsible (at least, that was my excuse). It was a huge challenge. I think we both did pretty well.

Though 826 Valencia was only 8 blocks away, they were eight of the longest blocks possible. We stopped for lunch at a taqueria with the magic word on the front: I yelled, ‘HEY! HEALTHY!’ and that was enough for me. But holy crap! It was good. Healthy Mexican food is a near-impossibility in the friendly midwest.

Refreshed, we made it to the pirate store. They were selling way more pirate-themed merchandise than before, which was both gratifying and goofy. I was hoping Dave Eggers’ new book was out, but no. So I lusted over McSweeney’s books, and then we left.

We got on a bus and rode up to Japantown. Because apparently, Saturday was all about my favorite places to shop. I’m not thrilled with Chinatown in San Francisco, but Japantown is the best. I could spend weeks in the bookstore alone, spending all my hard-earned cash, as well as some future savings. I bought a ‘tofu: the better white meat’ tshirt, which means my vegetarian tshirt collection has reached ridiculous proportions (I have three). I also added to my ridiculously-cute stationery collection at the paper store. And got the required netsuke and such. All good.

We took the bus back to the hotelish part of town. Powell and Market is near all the expensive boring shopping, like Nordstrom and Armani and crap. For some reason, Powell Street was insane that time of day, crawling with shoppers and strikers and people carrying signs that meant something to someone, I’m sure. The preacher at the cable car turnaround was on a roll, and would continue until late into the night.

We went upstairs and Stephanie laid down for a nap. I was going to scribble in my notebook (it’s like analog blogging) and knit, but I ended up dozing off and drooling on the bed for 20 minutes. Then I got up and speed-walked to two different Starbucks, as the first one had a line out the door. Since there were 10 of them within a three-block radius, it was pretty easy.

I have to note that I love my tourist-walking in big cities. I think it’s the only way to really get to know a place: walk out the door of your hotel by 7am, walk all day long, and walk back in sometime that night, completely worn out. Do that for a full week, and you might as well have lived there for months. This trip, it wasn’t as possible due to the ankle and the fact I wasn’t traveling alone. Which ended up being really good, too.

I called and pestered Jay for directions, and we set off on the MUNI train to see SBC Park, per Stephanie’s request. She’s not so much a sports enthusiast as a sports freak. The park was very cool, though, and we’d have seen a game there if they were playing. We did, however, get to see the remnants of the Love Parade. All I can say is that San Franciscans like to get either fuzzy or naked. Sometimes both.

We found our way to the California Street cable car and stood, freezing our supposedly cold-prepared asses off waiting. The cable cars like to taunt you by sitting on the opposite side of the street forever, and then creeping very very slowly in your direction. It finally arrived, and we rode over to the other side of Chinatown, to the Dar Bar Indian Restaurant, which I loved so much the first time around. Dinner was great, as expected. And as usual, we should’ve taken the bus, but wandered our way back through the Tenderloin to our hotel instead.

Sunday morning, I got up and did the coffee thing. I wandered around looking for a breakfast place in the neighborhood, but could find nothing good. We decided to ride down to Fisherman’s Wharf, which was a big mistake. An hour later, I was sitting with my head in my hands in a back stairwell because I was too dizzy to stand. Stephanie was on recon for food, while I ate my emergency box of raisins. After 15 minutes, I could walk again, so we went to Starbucks and a found a fruit and cheese thing for a ridiculous amount of cash. It was worth it anyway.

We took the bus up to Coit Tower. It was pretty foggy, and even Christopher Columbus was looking chilly. The elevator music was ‘What a Feeling’ from Flashdance. We giggled the whole way up to the top.

You can hear the sea lions all the way up in the tower! I love that. We wandered around, took lots of photos, and then headed back down the stairs. This time, I managed to not remove the skin from my knuckles and wrist on the way down, so I considered that a huge personal success.

We took the bus back down the giant hill into North Beach, and went for lunch at the same place I visited last year, Cafe Delucchi. The food there was just as good as I remembered. We ate panini and watched a woman eating with her tiny little dog in a tiny little sack strapped to the front of her body. He sat and stared at every forkful longingly, but she seemed not to notice. We decided that a tiny little dog in a tiny little sack was unquestionably a sure sign of a very high-maintenance girl.

More buses! This time to the Presidio. We rode through Cow Hollow, which looked to have amazingly good shops, so we were smart enough to not get off the bus. Our ultimate goal was to get over to the coast, but we had to figure out how to get around the Presidio first, and all we knew about that was that 1) it sounded intimidating and had something to do with the military, and 2) Metallica tried to record an album there. Unsuccessfully. So obviously, the odds were against us.

We walked down and saw the Palace of Fine Arts, the only remaining building from a 1915 expo. It’s attached to the Exploratorium, but the most we saw of that was the bathrooms.

After wandering around a while longer, we decided there was no way we were going to reach the ocean that day, time and energy levels being what they were. Also, it was cold and foggy. We took a bus through the marina and hopped off to see Lombard Street (the crookedest street in the universe!), then got back on another bus to head back to the hotel. It went down Stockton, right through the middle of Chinatown, and I had never in my life seen such bus insanity. We were already so packed together we couldn’t breathe, and there were a hundred more people cramming in the back doors. The bus driver was yelling at the passengers. Then he stopped and fought with another bus driver, and they switched. I watched him stomping angrily down the street as we drove away.

Back at the hotel, we put on even more clothes, then met up with Jay. He said, ‘What did you do today?’ Stephanie said, ‘Rode buses!’ We hopped on the trolley back to Pier 39. When we got to our tour boat for Alcatraz, there was already a huge crowd waiting in the cold. We couldn’t find seats inside, so we got to enjoy the elements out on the bay.

The night tour of Alcatraz was awesome, though. A guide led us up the hill and told us about the history of the island, then we took an audio tour inside. I have trouble paying attention to audio tours, but it was still good. The prison itself seems to be in pretty good shape; the other buildings on the island are gutted.

We heard a lot of stories as told by prisoners and guards. They talked about a few escapes, and the fact that there are no known successful escapees, but a few prisoners unaccounted-for. We got to go in the cells, including isolation.

We went to hear the presentation about the 1969 Native American occupation, which led us back down the hill in the even-more-painful cold. Stephanie kept wandering off to stare at the bay. I concentrated on the story so as to not notice the lack of feeling in my extremities. I didn’t like the tour guide’s attitude. Not one bit.

We made a point of rushing back to the boat and managed to get seats inside. Back at the pier, we got on the crowded trolley again. At the stop after ours, the driver yelled at a bunch of boarding tourists, ‘Girls up front! Boys in the back! Girls up front! Boys in the back!’ The men confusedly headed for the back door. The women climbed on, and the driver cracked up. He said, ‘I was just messing with you!’ and broke down in hysterics again. I couldn’t stop laughing.

Near our stop, I felt my bag being jostled, so I pulled it around in front of me and saw that it was open. My phone and wallet were still inside, so I figured I had left it open when I put my transit pass away. Then I noticed the shifty-looking dude next to me with his coat over his arm, and I knew I had just almost been pickpocketed. I tried to make eye contact as he moved away from me. A bunch of people got on and Jay ended standing up right in front of him, so I whispered to him to look out. He said afterwards he saw the guy try the same thing on another woman, also unsuccessfully.

Near-pickpocketing! I was excited. More excited than I’d have been if he had actually gotten my wallet.

We had dinner at a Thai noodle restaurant in the Tenderloin, because I guess Jay seemed to think it was funny to make us walk through that neighborhood every night. Their pad thai was great, and the house music was amusing. We left there late, full and tired, and dragged ourselves one more time back to our hotel in the cold.

I got up, did my usual coffee-rushing, and we got food at Le Cafe Powell (which can only be said with a ridiculous French accent). We boarded the N train to Ocean Beach, because we were determined to see the coast before we left.

The train took an hour, but we made it. It dropped us right at the beach bathrooms, which were scary but also necessary. It wasn’t as cold at the beach as we expected.

We walked a long ways along the water. I was searching for whole sand dollars and beach glass, both of which are usually hard to find but seemed in abundance there. Stephanie was freaking out over the jellyfish, especially when we found a huge one laying there, still quivering. We tried to decide whether it was still alive, and whether it made sense to try to push it back into the ocean. It washed back out anyway, and by now has probably stung an unsuspecting surfer.

My favorite find was the mini-pumpkin with ‘ADDICTION’ scrawled on it in Sharpie marker. What did that mean? Was it some kind of therapy? Write your issue on a gourd and toss it into the ocean? I found it fascinating. I threw it back, on the off chance it might help the victim somehow.

We walked up to the corner of Golden Gate Park, by the weird giant windmill, and caught the bus back to Market Street. It’s a mighty pleasant neighborhood a few blocks down, one where you walk fast and don’t, under any circumstances, make eye contact. We picked up our bags, rolled them down to the BART station, and took the train to the airport. We had to walk about 30 miles to the terminal, since apparently Northwest Airlines hasn’t been keeping up with its protection money payments.

After going through security and discovering they had removed all the food from our terminal, we walked 30 miles back to the main one, shopped at the SFMOMA store (since we didn’t get to the real thing), and ate a veggie burger at BJ. Yes, BJ.

When we got back to the gate, we hung out for a while until they announced they had moved our gate. We went to that one and it was packed with tired-looking Minnesotans. They told us the plane was overbooked. I went to ask the desk people about my meal, wanting to switch it from diabetic to vegetarian, which has better odds for me. The guy told me they didn’t do special meals anymore. I asked if that meant it was safe for everyone, and he didn’t know. I bought some trail mix at the shop just in case.

When they served dinner, our choices were salami (which ended up being pepperoni, to Stephanie’s dismay), and turkey sandwiches. I asked the flight attendant if they had a vegetarian meal. She looked at me as if I had just told her I was hijacking the plane to Venezuela. She said, ‘Well! This has mineral water and carrots, and this protein bar thing.’ I took my meal, since she made me feel as if not accepting it could land me in some trouble with the law.

Within an hour, I had run out of knitting. This was a crappy old 757, not the pimped-out A330 that had just the other day been built specially for us, so there was no in-seat chick flick or overdetailed map to enjoy. I read the in-flight magazine with Lily Tomlin on the cover. I perused the gift catalog with immense interest, offering to buy my sister half the useless junk for Christmas. She seemed to enjoy being interrupted from her reading every 5 minutes.

With an hour and a half left to go, I was bored to death. I took photos out the airplane window. I wrote a poem. I wrote down the pattern for the throw pillows I was making, because I just made it up but they were coming out beautifully. I ate some trail mix. I interrupted Stephanie some more. I organized my bag. I kept trying to check the time on my phone, and kept finding it turned off. I peered out the window at South Dakota, and finally Minnesota. And then we were home, and it was even colder than in California.

I woke up at 6am, feeling a little stiff. I got dressed, which consisted of putting on my shoes; I was going to arrive in San Francisco wrinkled and smelly, and didn’t really care. I went to the bathroom and put on my bra and contacts, shifted my hair around halfheartedly, and was on the road by 6:30. I ate a protein bar and drank a Red Bull (the poor man’s meth) and was wide awake. It was cold, in the 50s and foggy. I drove south, looking for somewhere to have breakfast by the beach. The roads were deserted until after 7am. It was still all tiny, winding highway, cattle farms, run-down houses, resorts, state beaches, and road construction. I was within 120 miles of San Francisco and might as well have been in Iowa.

The sun came out around 9am, as I arrived in Bodega Bay. I came across The Wharf, which got my business because it had the word ‘breakfast’ out front; everything else I had encountered up to that point had been closed. I had oatmeal, which I ate very slowly while I wrote postcards and in my journal. I almost peed my pants with excitement when I realized my cell signal had returned. There were a bunch of messages from home from the day before when they were considering sending out a search party. I messaged Heather, and decided to drive to the beach to hang out for a while and make some phone calls.

I went to the post office to drop off a huge bundle of postcards, then stopped at the espresso shop. The surfer dude running the place said that the beach north of town was the best in the area, but the currents were really dangerous. Even if I had wanted to swim, it was still too cold and windy. The beach was the southernmost of the Sonoma Coast state beaches, and it was incredible. I had the whole place to myself for a little over half an hour. I laid out my blanket, took off my shoes, and walked along the ocean. Then I sat down, grabbed my phone, and realized I was once again without a signal. So I wrote some more, then just sat and stared at the ocean. I looked down and noticed that I was writing with a pen from the Glacier Gateway Motel in Kalispell, Montana. It seemed so long ago.

Finally, I got up and decided to head back into town so I could call home. Before I did that, though, I felt like I had to get my life back in order. I opened the trunk and all the car doors. I dragged the entire contents of my vehicle into the parking lot, then set out to reorganize. I rolled up my sleeping bag and folded blankets. I emptied souvenirs from their bags and consolidated all of them in one large bag. I tossed out all the trash, dug wayward CDs out from under the seats, and spent a long time peering at my map to make sure I wasn’t missing anything. Then I went and had the Port-A-Potty experience I never wanted; I knew I had packed antibacterial wipes for a reason. My car organized (and, therefore, my sanity restored), I was on my way.

I figured my mom would yell at me for scaring her the day before, but she was just happy to hear from me. I talked to her for about 10 minutes, and then lost the signal again on the way out of Bodega Bay.

I drove a couple miles off the highway to see Bodega, the little surfer town where they filmed The Birds. From there, Highway 1 heads inland. I drove along Tomales Bay and saw oyster ships. Point Reyes Station was really cute, and one of the last towns before crossing into the Bay Area. I decided to stop there for lunch. I had time to kill, and I was worn out. I had a really good veggie burger at a restaurant I don’t remember the name of. I walked around the main street, stopping into a few shops, then got back on the road.

I decided to drive up Mount Tamalpais to get a view of the city I’d soon be visiting. About halfway up, I remembered that I really, really hated mountain driving. I went up and saw the amphitheatre, then drove all the way up to the lookout. It required hiking, which I was even less thrilled about, but I had to do it. I climbed up to the top and sat on the rocks at the base of the fire tower. I took a million pictures and tried to get my bearings by picking out features I could see: the Golden Gate. The Bay Bridge. Alcatraz. I once again could use my phone, since I was essentially sitting right by the cell tower. I called Heather and talked for a long time. I tried to tell her everything I’d been doing, but I was so tired that it was all a blur. Then I called Jay and got directions to his apartment. I wrote down everything he said: bridge – famous – red. s 101. downtown/marina. fork – right. 45 mns. I started back down the mountain and ran into some talkative old people. We compared cell phones. They welcomed me to California. One guy said he could tell I was excited because I sounded so enthusiatic on the phone. For a minute, I actually regretted my constant casual swearing. Who wants to offend friendly old people? Not me. At least, not these particular old people.

I drove down the hill and found myself lost in the wilds of Marin County. After a while, I managed to get myself back on the 101. Within five minutes, I was crossing the Golden Gate Bridge.

I didn’t mind paying $5 to enter San Francisco, but I wondered what they do to you if you don’t have cash. Shouldn’t they warn you about the tolls in advance? Anyway. It was clear and sunny, 60 degrees, and incredibly windy. I hated the hills instantly. I drove around for a while looking for a parking spot. When I finally found one two blocks away, I worried that it wasn’t a real spot, because it seemed too good to be true. I finally understood the street cleaning thing, too. What city cleans its streets every single week? I think it’s just an excuse to give parking tickets. I called Jay and he was just leaving work, so he told me where to find a Starbucks nearby. The guy behind the counter (I have trouble calling guys ‘baristas’) begged me to sell him my superspecial Starbucks card. (I haven’t mentioned this before, but my Seattle Starbucks card made me a celebrity everywhere I went. The baristas always wanted to know where I got it. Apparently, quite a few of them collect the cards.) I told him no way, I drove all the way to Seattle for that card. I sat and wrote and stared at the passersby, happy to be in a city again. At 4:30, I walked back up to Jay’s. His apartment is so cute. Also, he is correct about it being a fishbowl, which is pretty cool. The building has one of those old elevators with the gate you have to pull shut. Awesome.

We sat around and talked for a long time. Or, actually, I rambled, he listened. I couldn’t believe what a relief it was to see someone I knew after so long. We went to get my stuff out of the car, and I finally showered and changed clothes. He had decided to park my car over by Michelle’s where it would be easier to find a spot we could leave it in for a while. We drove over there, and the three of us went to dinner at a Thai place with trippy artwork and weird music. I had almost forgotten what tofu was. After dinner, they dropped me off at his apartment. I got my email, took another shower, and crashed. Hard.

– – – – –

random notes from my travel journal:

i wondered how long it would take me to start talking to myself in the car, and now i know: 8 days. it’s more a function of disconnect with the outside world, though – remoteness and lack of cell signal – rather than time, i think.

at 8 days, 3300 miles, that means i’ve averaged 400 miles a day. insane.

i saw an accident on hwy 1 – a timber truck had overturned on one of those hairpin curves. yesterday on the 101, i saw a camping trailer that had turned over and dumped its contents everywhere: cabinets, beds, luggage. it looked like it had been packed full. (is runawaytruck.com available? probably not.)

i have my own roadtrip inside joke: the garage magnet. it sucks having inside jokes only with yourself. sigh.

why do sf cops look like the village people?

i’m worried about my brakes here, even though they’re new. my car knows it doesn’t belong here, so it hates it.

is my butt orange from sitting on that mountain? i wonder if i look like a hick. cool.

i have a bruise on the palm of my hand from driving.

i hunch when i’m writing. i have to stop that. i don’t need a hump. not that kind of hump, at least.

– – – – –

I got up at 7:30 and dragged my clothes down to the laundry. If I arranged my laptop just right, I could pick up a few weak wireless signals from neighboring buildings. They were intermittent, but faster than dialup. Occasionally, I had to open the window and balance my laptop on the windowsill to get a consistent signal. Jay came home and we discussed what I should see in San Francisco. It was very strange to not have any idea, since I usually plan vacations obsessively. I paged through my road trip book. The AAA guide had a walking tour, which I’d had good luck with in other cities, so I decided on that. I had spent so much time driving, all I wanted to do was be outside and get some exercise. I finished my laundry, talked to Heather, did some actual work for my old company, and then headed out.

Halfway between Jay’s and Starbucks, I found Royal Gourmet Coffee. I quickly realized that I had stumbled upon the Holy Grail of the espresso-based beverage: Caffe Extreme. It was like a gigantic cappuccino, only better: 3 shots of espresso, a tiny bit of milk, and the rest regular coffee. It’s like this drink had been engineered especially for me.

I walked down to catch the cable car on California. I could probably have walked to Chinatown quicker (especially after figuring out that it’s much, much easier to just run down the hills in SF than walk them), but riding the cable car at least once in one’s life is obligatory. There was a little Asian man collecting fares from passengers. I heard him instructing a tourist couple not to stand in the 1′ x 1′ yellow square on the floor. They looked down at it suspiciously and the woman asked, “Why? What is it?” He replied, “That’s my office!”

I dismounted the cablecar and headed to Starbucks. To pee. You see, one thing you get good at detecting when you travel as much as I do is good bathrooms. When you find them, you stick with them. It’s restroom loyalty. In exchange for their good bathroom standards, the business gets your patronage. So: Starbucks almost always has good, clean bathrooms (except in NYC); and even though I’d already had enough caffeine to kill the weak or elderly, I got another coffee. I felt obligated.

I folded my walking map, ripped out of the AAA guide, into a tiny square and set off on my tour. I saw the swanky shopping (I was unimpressed, as I live in the land of malls), then the financial district, and ended up back in Chinatown. I resisted shopping there, since I didn’t want to haul crappy souvenirs around all day. I walked down the main street, then turned and went down a smaller street that was more real Chinatown and less touristy. Jay was correct in that I was the tallest person there by at least half a foot. The slow, meandering tourists annoyed me, but, luckily, I’m not afraid to elbow people in the kidneys whenever necessary. I turned down the half-block-long Jack Kerouac Alley and saw the home of the Beat. Then I found myself in North Beach, the Italian neighborhood. I stopped at a place called Cafe Delucci (Corso Cristoforo Columbo and Beach Blanket Babylon Blvd!) and ate the best salad of my entire life. After that, I stopped at Cafe Trieste, the first espresso shop in the country, to get myself a cappuccino. I’m not sure why I hadn’t stroked out at that point, but I was fine.

Heading off towards Coit Tower, I walked up some really steep hills, then climbed stairs. The caffeine must have been helping. I bought my ticket and took the elevator to the top to get my view of San Francisco.

On the way back down the stairs, I brushed the back of my hand against the rough concrete wall and scraped the hell out of it. My knuckles and wrist started bleeding. I subtly tried not to drip blood in the elevator, and went to the bathroom to wash my hand. It was bleeding a lot and I didn’t have anything to wrap it in, so I sat near the base of the tower for 20 minutes, waiting for it to stop. It looked pretty gory.

Finally, I got up and headed back down Lombard, then turned towards Fisherman’s Wharf. I walked past the cablecar turnaround, which was exciting in its oldschoolness. A family from Italy had just disembarked from a cable car, and I marveled that all five of them were dressed completely in denim. Were they fashion-forward or on the Levi’s payroll?

Fisherman’s Wharf didn’t thrill me. It was chock full of tourists and smelled fishy. I know, but still. I pushed my way through the crowds for a while, stopped into a couple crappy stores, and got the obligatory souvenirs. I walked down the Hyde Street Pier, which had a good view of the city and Alcatraz. I listened to a bitchy fashion photographer being a complete asshole to his models. Then I went over the Ghirardelli Square to see what the big deal was. It seemed kind of lame to me, but maybe that’s because I don’t eat chocolate. I started the long climb up Russian Hill. Yes, I could have just taken the cable car, but I felt like I had to do it, because it was ridiculous. At every corner, groups of people stood gasping and leaning against trees. I just kept putting one foot in front of the other, not thinking about it. Near the top, I stopped and took pictures of the other end of Lombard Street, ‘the windiest street in America!’ I didn’t feel much like going down and then back up the stairs, so I just stood and watched cars inching their way along it. My walking tour looped back to Chinatown at that point, so I headed off in the direction of Jay’s apartment instead. I called him to see which way to go, and he told me to walk down Polk, because it had good shops. I was walking and talking on the phone as I passed Good Vibrations. I stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, turned around, and went in. Not only was it the famous Good Vibrations, it was the antique vibrator museum. I saw a bunch of menacing-looking devices, and was grateful for modern technology. I bought many souvenirs, including giant vibrator postcards for all the folks back home.

We went to Whole Foods, then to dinner at The Window down the block right by my new favorite coffeeshop in the entire universe, Royal Gourmet Coffee. I was worn out; apart from lunch in North Beach, I had been walking all day long. I went to bed around midnight, and decided to leave the blinds open. Around 12:30, I saw the fog rolling in, slowly creeping down the street. At 1am, the moon came up. It was unbelievable and perfect.

– – – – –

random notes from my travel journal:

man. if i didn’t drink so much coffee, i wouldn’t have this constant need to pee. i am not smart.

what would my roadtrip be without injuries? i’m all bloody. really awesome.

on the way back here, i got whistled at by the same construction workers who whistled at me this morning. or maybe it’s the second shift? do they trade off whistling?

i have bright red abrasions on my right hand to match the big blue bruise on my left. badge of honor! it’s proof that i did more than ride a tour bus around all day. man, i totally left dna evidence all over that tower, though.

– – – – –

I woke up at 6am because it was too bright to sleep. I got up and stretched and was cranky. I worked on Jay’s computer for a long time, and had to reboot about 50 times. I emailed Heather and went for coffee. When I got back, Jay was home, so I complained for a while, and then decided to walk around SF and shop. He gave me directions, and I set out.

I walked through Japantown, but didn’t shop, since it was near his house and I could go back later. On the way to the Haight, I passed my car and verified that it was still there and intact. Haight Street had all the hippie stuff I expected: souvenir shops with tie-die, sarongs, glass pipes, and trippy artwork. Also, it had a ton of little galleries, clothing stores, and restaurants. I bought myself a few things, and got souvenirs for the folks back home. I almost freaked at Kid Robot, which had pretty much every goofy toy I’ve ever wanted to buy, including those I didn’t know existed. (Seriously, check out the robot I bought.) I congratulated myself on not spending too much money; I count this among one of my most important achievements. I walked down Haight to Hippie Hill (!), then turned around and walked back. There was good shopping in Upper Haight, then a nice residential area with lots of Victorians, then more shopping and restaurants. I stopped at a cafe where they made my iced latte with coffee ice cubes, probably the best idea I’d ever heard. I ate half of a monstrous Mediterranean sampler, then stopped at the natural foods market for water. The guy behind the counter pretended to be scared of my obviously fight-induced injuries. I decided that from then on, I was telling people it was from a fistfight.

I headed down to the Castro, and enjoyed the shopping and many friendly dykes. I walked past the Mission Dolorosa, thus beginning my California mission adventure. After that, I found my way to Valencia, looking for Dave Egger’s shop, because if there’s one thing I love, it’s pirates. Ahoy!

Visiting 826 Valencia was a pilgrimage of sorts. I snickered my way around the pirate store, and bought a tshirt and a signed copy of You Shall Know Our Velocity, which Amazon had still failed to make magically appear in my mailbox.

I walked up to the Mission and was unimpressed. It was dirty and there were prostitutes everywhere; maybe I was in the wrong place? I headed up Mission, looking for a street I recognized. I found Gough and followed that. I crossed Market, then noticed Flax Art and Design on the corner behind me, so I went back. On the way out, I took Gough Street again, then all of a sudden it was Olivia, then Haight, and I was lost. I knew I was tired because I couldn’t read the map anymore. I finally stopped into a coffeeshop and asked the guy behind the counter how to get back to Gough. He pointed me in one direction, then thought for a minute and pointed me in another. I felt a little relieved knowing that even someone who lived there was sometimes confused about directions.

I found Gough again, and was less than thrilled to encounter a giant hill a few blocks up the street. By the time I had dragged my ass back to Jay’s, I knew I was done walking for a while. I laid down and took a nap.

That night, we went to Millennium for dinner. I had bbq tempeh and polenta. The food was incredible. Afterwards, I went to bed exhausted again. I intended to go to SFMOMA the next morning; since it didn’t open until 10am, it was a good excuse to sleep in.

– – – – –

random notes from my travel journal:

apparently, i look like less of a tourist than i suspect, because people keep asking me directions.

i have the stupidest sunglasses tan/burn ever.

– – – – –

I got up early again, contrary to my intentions. I got dressed and worked on the computer, which was the worst possible way to occupy myself that morning. I spent two hours on the phone with tech support, getting more and more angry. I didn’t realize it at that moment, but I was in the grips of the worst PMS ever*.

* [If you pay any attention to Sex Week on the Discovery Channel, you know the wide-ranging control of female hormones upon the fate of humanity. Now, Heather’s hormones in particular have been known to affect international warfare, the tides, and sometimes even the rotation of the earth. 2,000 miles away from her influence, I found myself completely at the whim of my own usually fair-tempered hormones. Things got ugly.]

Jay came home for a while and somehow, miraculously, survived. When he left for work, I was still hunched irritably over the machine. Sometime around 2pm, I gave up and went out. I had walked past several restaurants on Gough Street the day before, so I headed back down the giant hill in search of food. Since it was between lunch and dinner, several of the restaurants were closed. I examined the menus of the other half, and couldn’t find anything I could eat.

I kept going. At one point, I was crying and walking. Otherwise, just walking. I found myself back in the Castro, and wandered into a little coffeeshop. I got a roasted mushroom sandwich and coffee, and sat out back on the patio in the sun. Of course, I had run out without bringing anything to do, not even my travel journal, so I read People from front to back, and chatted with the guy at the counter for a while, which cheered me up a little.

After lunch, I felt much better, realizing that half my problem was that my blood sugar was so low. I stopped into a few galleries and shopped, then wandered back in the direction I had come from. Without realizing it, I had walked a lot farther than I had intended. But walking is good therapy, so I was glad.

I went to Japantown, and found my way into the mall. I was in heaven. I liked the bookstore the most, and had to resist buying all the crazy magazines and the translated-from-english novels (Stephen King! In Japanese!). I bought a Hello Kitty magazine, and the First Book of Sushi for Heather:

Miso in my sippy cup,
tofu in my bowl.
Crab and avocado
fill my California roll.

At a china shop, I bought about ten different netsuke, because each one I found was cuter than the last. The only thing that kept me from spending a ton of money there was that everything was as expensive as if it had been Japan. I sat in the plaza by the fountain and checked in with the parents. Then I went to the grocery store and bought grapes and raisin rolls. When I’m in Japantown, I know how to party.

I walked back to Jay’s, dropped off my new acquisitions, and headed down to Starbucks, where the same guy behind the counter begged me to sell him my superspecial card, and I once again dashed his hopes and dreams. I sat there for an hour and scrawled in my journal, which was quickly devolving from a travelogue into a preteen girl’s diary (see below). Such is PMS.

I went back to Jay’s after 6 and finally, finally got the computer running. I still wasn’t feeling great, but they convinced me to go to dinner. The tradition known as fratboy pizza wasn’t happening that night, so we ended up at an Indian-Pakistani restaurant nearby. It had weird clientele, good food, and awesome service, and sort of reminded me of our last night in New Orleans at the happiest Indian restaurant on earth.

– – – – –

random notes from my travel journal:

holy crap. japantown has a denny’s. that’s even better than the chinese starbucks in dc.

it’s hard to be enthusiastic about seeing things when i feel like crap.

___ is making me insane. they’re technically clueless and defensive, which is the worst possible combination. ____ called me this morning. it was so hard not to yell.

being away this long is disorienting. i know where i am, but it’s not real to me at all. i think it’s the lack of short-term memory. according to my amnesia, i now live in san francisco, which could be any city, really. i forget about my daily routine. i suspect i’m doing something horribly wrong, which will likely ruin my life. i think i have cancer. all i know how to do is walk and eat and run away when i get stressed. i’ve realized how incredibly bad my decision-making skills are when i’m pressured. i hate that feeling of panic. i’ve become ok with crying in public and stopping dead for a minute or two to collect my thoughts. i don’t bother putting on a contented look when i don’t feel that way. it’s almost easier to be a stranger, completely anonymous. but i still rely on contact with people i know. like, still having that connection to the world i actually belong in.

i can understand how sometimes people wander off and are never heard from again. however, i’m not that person. i need to feel like i belong somewhere. i need a long rope attached to something stable.

i also realize that i crave this sense of displacement and surreality. it’s like testing how much i can handle. it’s why i keep up the frantic pace, too. if i stay in one place too long, it’ll start feeling real to me. i’ve been here four days now, which is a lot. i know i’m in sf, but it’s meaningless to me. i have to keep reminding myself: california. pacific ocean. it could be anywhere; i know it as well as i know any other place except home.

other tourists are happy to take pictures and buy postcards. i do those things, and i also rush around with a blank stare, wondering where the hell i am half the time. i think this is why so many people are medicated: to stop questioning.

i’ve started to hate the question, ‘what are you going to do about it?’ because i so rarely have the answer anymore. or i know the answer is ‘nothing.’

man, this is not a travel journal anymore. it’s a paranoid’s diary. i’m a freak. i’m going to stare at californians now and wonder what’s going on tonight.

– – – – –

I got up and logged to Priceline to book my room for Los Angeles. $35 at the Hilton, which meant that I was spending more for crappy hotels in the middle of nowhere than I was for nice hotels in big cities. Jay came home with my car, and told me that I not only needed to get a replacement gas cap (the car wasn’t the performance vehicle it normally was), but my headlight was burnt out. Dammit. He was heading out of town for the weekend, so we said goodbye. I drove over to the auto parts store and had both the gas cap and headlamp installed within 10 minutes, for a total of $25. From there, I got on the Bay Bridge and headed east.

Outside Oakland, it’s all rolling hills, dry grass, and wind farms. I loved all the windmills lined up along the tops of the hills. They were cool and menacing at the same time. The farther I got from the bay, the warmer it got. It had been 50 degrees and misty in SF. By the time I exited 520 in Manteca, it was in the mid-80s.

The route to Yosemite was pretty, but slow. It winds through little towns and produce farms. I stopped at a roadside farmer’s market and bought one of nearly everything. About 40 miles from Yosemite, the mountains start. On the steep parts, I had to turn off the air conditioning, and at that point it was over 100 degrees. With all the windows and the sunroof open, it didn’t feel that bad, but my back and the backs of my legs were soaking wet.

I stopped for gas outside Yosemite. I had to pee badly, so I locked the car and ran into the gas station first. Then I came back out and went to pump gas. When I pulled on the little fuel door, it wouldn’t open. It was stuck! I tugged some more, and it wouldn’t move. I thought maybe someone had bumped my car, and indented it or something. I yanked harder and harder, and finally it popped open. My car beeped and the doors unlocked, and I realized what had happened: the little door locks shut when you lock the car. I felt like an idiot. I looked up and saw a girl sitting in the car behind me, watching. I smiled and shrugged.

While the gas was pumping, I went to wash the windshield. The squeegee had the longest handle ever, probably for big trucks. I was hurrying, and paid the price for my reckless squeegeeing: I hit myself in the mouth with the handle. At that point, nothing stupid I could do could possibly surprise me, so I finished with the window, put the gas cap back on (at least I remembered that), and got back in the car. I looked in the mirror, and my lip was bleeding down my chin.

I got to Yosemite around 11am, and congratulated myself on the fact that my National Parks pass had already paid for itself. I drove up to about 6000 feet, then down into the valley. I stopped and hiked to Bridalveil Falls. The spray was a relief from the heat. There were lots of people there, wading around in the stream, trying to keep cool. The heat made visiting the pit-toilet restrooms an endurance test: how long can I hold my breath while peeing? How fast can I run away and find someplace to wash my hands? I noticed that all the tourists there were slow-moving, although maybe it was the heat. I felt bad barging my way through them to experience America’s natural wonders, but I had a schedule to keep.

I parked and walked to Yosemite Village. I shopped at the general store, which was annoyingly mobbed. I went to the deli and got the biggest, blandest veggie sandwich I had ever tasted. I picked it apart and drank my americano while writing postcards. While I was sitting outside at a picnic table, I looked up and a few tables over, a girl was sitting there with her sandwich, a notebook, and a stack of postcards, with a stuffed-full backpack by her side. My counterpart! All of a sudden, I didn’t feel so alone.

I finished lunch and took the rest of the drive through Yosemite valley, then headed back. The drive was slow and boring, and the heat wasn’t letting up as the sun went down. I distracted myself by talking on the phone, as usual. The view of SF coming back over the Bay Bridge was amazing. I was proud of myself for figuring out where to exit and how to get back to Jay’s without even looking at the map, and especially for getting a spot right out in front of his building. I walked to Whole Foods and got a tofu sandwich, which was just as bland as the veggie sandwich I had eaten for lunch. I did laundry, packed up my stuff, and loaded the car so I could get on the road as fast as possible the next morning.

– – – – –

random notes from my travel journal:

that was a whole lot of pms yesterday. i hope that goes away quick. anyway.

my nose and forehead are peeling today. my scraped hand is killing me. the skin feels tight, and i keep bumping it. also, i left my sunscreen at jay’s. i am smart.

i’ve decided the strangest places to travel alone are the national parks. they’re all family-oriented. it’s weird to see a group of fewer than four people here.

i hope my car will see me through. i worry even more when it’s so hot. me and chico, we’ve been through a lot together.

i think i want to keep this up when i get back. probably not handwritten, although my handwriting would improve. it’s too slow, but tactile, which is nice. hmm. maybe someday it’ll develop into that journal-writing project.

tomorrow night, la. i consider sf the midpoint of my trip, so that means that everything from here on out is technically heading towards home.

my pants are too big. they need a belt. go figure.

ok. i think that’s it from sf. what a strange feeling.

– – – – –

Saturday morning, I got up at 6:30. Leaving the blinds open was a natural alarm clock that I was getting to like. I had been having a dream that I was making out with Dave Matthews, and that he had some kind of weird kink I couldn’t remember afterwards. I got ready as fast as possible and went for my last caffe extreme at Royal Gourmet Coffee. Sigh. I got on the 101. It was sunny and cold in SF, and got more and more foggy the closer I got to the coast. I drove along, my stomach hurting from drinking so much coffee, thinking, “I know there’s an ocean here somewhere.”

I got to Santa Cruz a little before 10am. The rides at the boardwalk didn’t open until 11, which was fine. I walked around, took pictures, and got a cappuccino. I watched the karate classes taking place on the beach, which was already crowded despite being cold and foggy.

I took a detour from the 1, heading inland to San Juan Bautista. I saw truckloads of migrant workers laboring on produce farms in 90-degree weather. The mission was incredible. It reminded me of the ones we had seen a few years ago in San Antonio. I’m fascinated by missions; being nonreligious, I find their history pretty horrifying, but the architecture is amazing. It’s a good blend of scary and cool. I especially like the cemeteries, with their circles of stones and simple wooden crosses.

Not only is San Juan Bautista on El Camino Real, it’s right on the San Andreas Fault. I contemplated this as I walked into the little town to see the outdoor craft market. The crafts were the same kind of thing you could get anywhere. It was hot and I wasn’t feeling well. I stopped at a coffeeshop which just happened to have sugar-free ice cream, and was happy. I sat and drank a bottle of water, watched people wandering around the street, and wrote postcards. I walked some more, then stopped at a food stand where they cheerfully agreed to make their sampler plate into something portable just for me, shoving falafel, hummus, and vegetables into a pita. I walked back to the car, dripping tahini on the sidewalk.

Heading back to the coast, there was a huge traffic jam on the 101. I looked up and saw a sign that read Los Angeles: 350 mi. I wanted to cry. I hadn’t looked at my map in days, and had no idea it was that far. It was after noon, and I had hardly made any progress. I’d have to hurry.

It took about half an hour to get to Monterey. It was beautiful and sunny, so the town was crowded. I parked and jumped out of the car long enough to see the waterfront, use the bathroom, and walk down cannery row (why do all west coast cities seem to have a cannery that’s been converted into cheesy shops and restaurants?) then got back on the road. I found the entrance to the 17-Mile Drive in Pacific Grove. At $8.25, it was worth every penny of the $.50 per mile. The coastline was unbelievable. I saw the Lone Cypress. I saw the Ghost Tree. I saw how people live when they’re completely cut off from reality, and decide to charge people for the privilege of driving through their neighborhood. I saw seals! Fat and grey and lazy, they made me homesick for my cats.

I stopped at Pebble Beach to get postcards to prove I was there. Unfortunately, you can’t buy postcards at Pebble Beach. You can buy golf shirts and antiques and probably your very own custom-built servants, but no postcards. I peed angrily in working-class protest (in the restroom, of course) and exited at Carmel(-by-the-Sea! Best city name ever!). It was such a cute, artsy little town, I wanted to spend time wandering around it, but I had miles and miles left to drive that day.

I got back on the 1 and drove as fast as the narrow, winding highway and slow traffic would allow. Big Sur was desolate and beautiful. I was pretty sure it was even better than the northern coast. Every 10 miles or so, there would be a gas station that would have everything: cabins/motel, restaurant, convenience store, etc. I wasn’t picky and wanted to stop, but every time I neared one, the slow vehicle ahead of me would turn and I would think, “Hey! Now I can go fast!” and I’d speed off. I alternated between ‘performance-car commercial’ and ‘unsafe tailgating out-of-towner’.

I saw the Hearst Castle from afar, not wanting to take the shuttle bus up to it. I decided to get off the highway for dinner in San Luis Obispo, since I wanted to see the mission anyway. The city was really cute and seemed to have lots of good restaurants. I put it near the top of my list of places to re-visit when I have more time to spend. I saw the mission quickly, then went to find food. I didn’t want to take the time to stop and eat – I had only managed 200 miles in 9 hours – so I found a natural grocery and ran in. I got a bunch of fruit, and some protein bars and snacks, and got back on the 101, shoving a banana into my mouth. On the way out, I passed the Madonna Inn, which Jay had told me about months before and I’d completely forgotten about.

I was starting to worry because I still had so far to go. That was the problem with not planning. I called my sister and talked for almost an hour, calling her back whenever I’d drive into a valley and lose my signal. I passed Pismo Beach and Solvang, barely noticing. I got to Santa Barbara just as the sun was setting. I might have considered just staying on the highway, but there was a huge traffic jam anyway, so I exited. I was glad that I did, because the city is beautiful, and sunset was the perfect time of day to see it.

Santa Barbara is touristy, but in a classy way. The main drag is lined with huge palm trees all along the massive beach. I wanted to stay, but it was getting dark.

I got back into the traffic jam and almostly immediately felt sick. Something I had eaten had too much sugar in it. I slumped against the door and tried to concentrate on traffic. All I could think about was passing out in my hotel bed in LA. I switched the CD to the Foo Fighters and cranked it, hoping it would keep me awake. Luckily, it passed after about 15 minutes, and I felt my head clear. At that moment, I was passing through Ventura. The moon was full and bright, and they were shooting fireworks from the beach. It was a perfect moment.

I was thrilled driving in LA after spending so much time on 2-lane, winding highways. I loved those massive, 12-lane structures where everyone drives like they’ve got to get someone to the emergency room but quick. I was laughing out loud as I drove because my primary frame of reference for LA was The Big Lebowski. Everytime I saw an In-N-Out Burger, I thought, “Shut the fuck up, Donny!” Then I laughed even harder when I saw that there were FIVE exits for LAX. I got off at Century Boulevard and quickly found my hotel. It was 10pm – I had spent 14 hours in the car that day. I gasped with relief as I spiraled down the parking ramp. I dug clothes out of my bag (I was unsure of the weather, but figured I wouldn’t be needing my hoodie anymore), organized the car, grabbed my travel guides, and took the elevator to the lobby.

I made my way to the check-in line, trying not to stagger. I was exhausted and my blood sugar had crashed again, so I was disoriented and dizzy. I did my best just to hold it together enough to not seem crazy; I accomplished this by fixating on my phone, messaging Heather. Finally, it was my turn, and it was all I could do not to put my head on the counter while I was checking in. I got to my room and dumped half my stuff on the floor and the rest on the bed. I wanted to write and look at maps, but I couldn’t. I switched on the TV for two minutes to try and find the weather for the next day, but even that was too much effort, and I switched it off right away. I jumped in the shower, then fell into bed. By 11pm, I was comatose.