San Francisco

Well, I thought I should give you a quick update on where we have been / what we are doing. After leaving Disneyland, we headed North via the I1 highway (up the coast). We stopped at Santa Monica Pier for lunch, then proceeded up the coast, going through Malibu, up through Santa Barbara, and ending up at Lompoc for the night. The coastline is absolutely stunning, with lots of cliffs, beaches and RV parks. We spent approximately 5 minutes looking around Lompoc, and came to the conclusion that there is not a lot there, and appears to be a military accommodation city, as all the houses literally are the same - with 2 different shades of beige as a choice of exterior colour (Vandenburg Air Force base is a few minutes North). We found out afterwards that there is also a large "Mens Colony" (we refer to them as prisons!) there. After a night at Lompoc, we headed up to San Francisco. We got in @ 6pm and easily found our accommodation near Stinson beach after driving over the Golden Gate bridge. After a quick dinner at a nearby restaurant, we hit the sack ready for a big day the next day.

That brings us to today - we started out by heading into Fishermans Wharf via the Ferry. It was a foggy morning, but cleared after lunch time. Fishermans wharf was fantastic, and after watching a street performer, we headed to a cafe for a seafood lunch, which was unbelievably fantastic. Overlooking the 300 odd sea lions who gather a pier 39, with Alcatraz in the background eating clam chowder was slightly surreal, but a lot of fun - it was probably the first meal Nyah was entertained (by the sea lions) enough to stay in her high chair the whole of lunch time. After lunch we took a 2.5 hour guided trolley tour, which was fantastic. The tour guide was an old dude, who was a Russian immigrant with a thick accent. When he introduced himself as Igor, we had to laugh, as he looked and sounded like an Igor, even before he told us his name. He had obviously been there a long time, and gave us a lot of cool info about the places we visited, and apparently we hit on one of the few days where you could see the whole of the Golden Gate bridge (apparently 80-85 days a year is all the blue sky they get). We then headed back to the ferry, and back to our hotel for the night, and the boys had an obligatory swim in the pool, even though today has been the coldest day so far (we had to buy jackets at the wharf it was so cold).

All in all, we LOVE San Francisco - the atmosphere, the scenery, the history, everything here we have experienced would put San Francisco into the "most desirable place to live in California" category (despite its 800 earth tremors every year). Almost every house has a view (and no yard), very low crime rate, beautiful properties (which are apparently among the most expensive in the world, with small 1 bedroom properties > $1 Million, and small 3 br terrace houses >$4 Million. If we had to pick a place to live over here - San Francisco would be it (if we could afford it!). If you only had a few days in California, I would fly into San Francisco rather than LA any day of the week.

Tommorrow we head to Medford via the Napa Valley, then to Portland and Seattle for 2 days before getting into Vancouver on the 23rd. Until we get our next post done, we hope you are enjoying reading about our adventures, and look forward to receiving any comments / emails etc asking anything (in case we forget stuff) and letting us know what you guys are doing back at home. We are all missing everyone back at home, and look forward to hearing from you as well.