So where do I begin with SF, it is truly an amazing city and has overtaken NYC in my favourite US city. We arrived from a long trip from Yosemite in the evening and pretty much crashed straight away.

The next day we took the bus up to Pier 41 and took the ferry to Alcatraz. We started the day with a talk from Nancy, a 65 yr old guard who looked like she should be baking Betty Crocker cookies in the kitchen rather than talking about the history and criminals who passed through the walls of the prison. She was hiarious though and very animated. I wanted her to be my new grandma. We spent quite a while walking around with the spoken guide via headsets (I have just realised these are called audio-sets). They used the voices of the real guards and inmates who had spent time at Alcatraz. The tour was really well organised and very informative.

We got back and headed to North Beach for some italian grub. The area is a very italian area and Sandra said it felt that she was back in Italy. They even had the Italian flag on the lamp posts dictating the italian zones. The food was great and felt good to sit outside on the sidewalk and soak up the sun. The afternoon was spent hiking up the frickin' hills in SF to get to Lombard street which is the croockest street - if you haven't seen pictures before, check out mine on the photo bit. We are talking a mass incline which winds back and forth up a street about 5 times.

That night we went to visit a friend of mine who I had met via my travels last time who now lives in SF. So we went to Rachel's house over near the marina and sampled some red wine from the wine region which her boyfriend's brother owns. It was really good wine. We then followed that down with some lush cocktails from down the road. All in all a great night and so nice to see Rachel and one of her friends.

On Wednesday we spent the day in the Mission and also Castro.Rach kindly set us a list of must-dos in the city. We wandered the streets and got a real feel for the area. It was kind of spanish-like with quirly shops. After some amazing lunch at Tartines (grilled cheese and jelly sandwich) and even better ice cream from b-rites we continued on to Castro which is known as the gay area in the city. In my mind I had pictured big burly men, holding hands while walking a more than cat than dog looking pet. And that is exactly what I saw - amazing. The events got quirkier still when we reached The Haight which is a known hippy area so had fun looking around all the shops. Now in the above I fail to mention that by this point I am getting worse and worse in terms of ill. But I just carried on (idiot I am).

Thursday we had a pretty chilled day as wanted to wait up for the wedding. We headed to the Ferry Building for some grub and had a wander around some of the other areas of town. That night the hostel had a bar crawl so headed along after downing neat rum in our room (yes we are picky 13 yr olds). Before the crawl we went for some leaving drinks of Rach's friend Maura so got to check out another local bar which was fun. The crawl wasn't that great so decided to head back for a sleep before the wedding. We ended up watching the wedding in the hostel in thier movie theatre. At the beginning there were about 12 of us in all and by the end it was just Sandra and a 50 yr old hippy traveller. So it was good to watch but way too tired to enjoy it properly. Ppl have said since "Dang, you guys missed the wedding!" We are like yep and so??

Friday was a wipe out as so tired from staying up until the wee hours. So spent the afternoon wandering around Chinatown. Take the one in London, make it more authentic, add a load more restaurants and sellers and there you have the one in SF - so in short it was great.

Saturday had to be my best day yet. We hired bikes and went cycling all over. 1st heading to Golden Gate park which was full of different art areas, gardens, lakes. Best of all it has a windmill and leads to a beach. After cycling along the boardwalk we headed to the bridge. About 10 mins after getting to the bridge we then figure out actually how to get on it (don't ask). The cycle was amazing and I was grinning ear to ear the whole way - truly amazing experience. Wouldnt be quite the same doing the same thing over the Severn bridge - especially with the Welsh rain. After the bridge we headed to Sausilito which is a quaint little harbour town on the other side. I had an amazing sandwich, Sandra also managed to get a gluten free one. But I took a down turn and spent another $10 buying different drugs to cure my phlegm (nice). Luckily we didn't have to cycle all the way back as had ferry tickets. When we got back to the terminal Katie and I decided to go down Lombard Street (see description above) on the bikes. Just for fun. The last 25 minutes of the ride were the hardest all day. First of all to get to Lombard Street we had to push (as you cannot even cycle) the bikes up 2 steep hills. On the second hill we became a bit of a hit with the tourists on the buses - yeah whatever you fat idiots taking the bus up is so cheating. They kept taking our photos as probably thought it would be funny to show their friends at home 2 very red and sweaty looking girls panting up the hill. The ride down was hilarious. I couldnt actually sit on my bike and had to semi stand and semi lean on the bike and I pushed down with full force on the handle bars. After this we then headed back to the bike shop. This was without realising to get back meant climbing another 3x steep incline hills. The best was the way down when I accidently shouted "f*ck me" at the slope infront of me. To which this yank replied "you gotta love the Brits"!

The following day we picked up a car again and headed from PCH. Now in the above I havent mentioned 2 very, not exactly special people, who became part entertainment and part irritation of our stay. These would be our roommates. Roomie no1 was fugitive from China who stayed in her PJ's all day, ordered smelly chinese food and even ordered clothes from the net. She would be up all day and night with her laptop and when she was asleep the laptop was still on. We suspected she was on the run after losing her student visa - part of this may be true due to some papers we read which she accidently left "laying around". Anyway... Roomie no2 was Teresa Towers. And no she wasn't a prostitute or porn star but the loudest snorer EVER. She could even compete with my dad which is saying something. She kept all of us up for two nights running so she was not in our good books. And she had weird shoes. If you ever come across her, run!

So that was SF, in all was great but started to get more ill towards the end. Luckily it didnt ruin my time in SF as it is amazing. My parents are heading there in September so trying to see if they want a "tour guide" to go along.

Next stops are San Luis Obispo and Sandra's last few days in CA - sob...