So, after saying goodbye to Mum and Dad at the airport I made my way through security and decided I had enough time to nip to the loo before going over to Gate B to catch my flight. As soon as I got out of the toliet I look up to see that it says 'Flight closing'. ARGH!! Panic ensues and I pretty much ran the whole way through the terminal to the gate. That wouldn't be so bad if it was a short walk, but oh no, they say leave 20 minutes to get to your gate. After what seemed like a marathon, 2 flights of really steep escalators and a quick sprint I made it to the plane, which luckily, hadn't left without me!!

The flight was pretty uneventful. It wasn't full so I didn't have any screaming children sitting next to me! Managed to watch 4 films, have a quick nap and a natter with Barry, the guy sitting next to me before we landed. After what felt like the Spanish Inquisition I was finally let into the USA, picked up my bag and caught the shuttle to the hostel. It was pretty foggy when we landed, just how I left the UK!

The room at the hostel has been nice, the first night there was just me and another girl, Pia, in the room. I pretty much just crashed out when I got here, had a bit of a nap and went for a shower. Then Pia took me for a wander round SF and Union Square, which is where our hostel is. At night the only way to describe the city is 'bustling'. Loads of people, bright lights, quite a few beggars, the cable cars trundling past. We went for a quick drink at a nice bar that the people at the hostel had recommended and then came back to the hostel and went to sleep!! Nothing very exciting unfortuntately!

Saturday morning I went for a 'Historic Walk round Downtown San Francisco'. I thought it would be a good way to find my way around and meet some other people. We all met down in the lobby of the hostel and our guide, a lecturer at the Uni, came and explained to us what we'd be doing for the next 3 hours or so. He was carrying a massive ringbinder entitle 'Radical San Francisco'. It was at this point I started to get slightly worried what I had signed myself up for! The tour was pretty interesting, I learnt SOME interesting facts about SF but to say our guide was 'eccentric' is an understatement!! Along with the facts about the city we kept getting told about all these movements in San Francisco and A LOT about land in the city and this guy called Henry George who advocated social justice by getting rid of private land value ownership. This was the boring bit, and our guide went on about this for the majority of the tour. At one point he was stood in this street pretending a lamp post was a tree and asking us if he cut it down how much of it was his own in the time of the American Frontier and the first settlers in SF, in Henry George's time and today. I felt like I was unintentionally being recruited for some radical group and that he was going to whip out a child catcher-esque net and not let us go!!

When we finally managed to get away from the tour guide, which took some doing, I set off up to Fisherman's Wharf with Victoria, another one of my roomates who had been in SF for a training course for a few days and had turned it into a long weekend trip. We caught the bus up to the Wharf but got off half way there so we could see the crookedest street in San Francisco. Little did we realise that to get to the crooked street we had to climb a ridiculosly steep road! All the sensible people get the cable car (tram!!) to the top of the street and then walk down it. If we'd realised how steep the walk was at the time I think we would have done the same!! After huffing and puffing our way up the slope for what felt like forever we got to the top and looked around. Wow, is pretty much the only way to describe it. The view across the city and down into the bay from there is amazing, and it was such a lovely day too. After taking loads of pictures to prove we did walk up it we set off down the hill to the bay and the wharf. After a quick mooch around we went to get some food as we were absolutely starving!! We didn't really stay up there for too long and after admiring the Sea Lions we came to get the cable car back into the city. That night we went out for a drink with Pia and our other new roomate Keira and again, unexcitingly, we were all in bed by about 10.30!

On Sunday I headed back out to Fisherman's Wharf with Keira. The plan was to walk out to the Golden Gate Bridge and then do some of the other stuff around the Wharf. I'm glad someone pointed out to me that the map isn't to scale otherwise I think I would still be stranded out somewhere along the Bay! In the end Keira and I rented bikes and cycled across the Bridge. It's a really good way to see the Bay and the Bridge, and it was a really good day to do it too, the weather was lovely. It seems odd that it's November as I've been walking round in a strappy top for the past few days. I even managed to catch the sun a bit on the bike ride. When we picked up the bikes our plan was to ride along the Bay, over the Bridge and down into Sausilito and then ride back again. I think we were pretty over enthusiastic when we thought we could manage that, we'd forgotten about THE HILLS!! In the end we made it over to Sausilito and caught the ferry back over to Fisherman's Wharf in the afternoon.

I feel like I've spent most of my time while I've been here up at Fisherman's Wharf. I headed up there again on Monday and walked along the Pier to catch the ferry to Alcatraz. I really enjoyed Alcatraz. They make it sound like the walk up the hill to the prison block is a mountain, which got me quite worried as my legs have been killing me from all the hills, but luckily it wasn't! Most of the buildings that housed the guards and their families are closed as quite a lot of the Island is falling apart. In the Cell Block you get to go on an audio tour given to you by 4 of the guards and 4 of the ex-cons which is really interesting, it talks you through the 2 major escape attempts, what life was like living in the cells and how it was so hard for the prisoners to be so close, yet so far from freedom. In the whole time the Island was used as a prison there were 14 escape attempts and no-one is known to have survived if they made it off the Island. There was one guy who managed to escape and was found holding on to the posts at the bottom of the Golden Gate Bridge. Within 2 hours he was back in his cell!!

After Alcatraz I went to the Aquarium at the Bay, which wasn't very interesting if I'm honest! The ones in Birmingham and Hull are better than that!! We went to The Cheesecake Factory that night, YUM!! On the Tuesday I headed back out to the Wharf yet again, although this time I was only there for an hour or so to use my Bay Cruise ticket. After that I caught the bus over to the Exploratorium which was pretty cool. I was going to head down to Golden Gate Park after that but got a bit lost so just headed back to Union Square!!

I'm just about to go check out of the hostel now and go do a bit of shopping before I head to the airport for my flight to Vegas!! Woo! I'll write again when I get to LA!