21st - 25th February - San Francisco
Made it to San Fran the next day after another 8 hour bus trip. Hostel is right in the middle of downtown which is a top location, although unfortunately there were about 1,000 French kids staying there the first night which was agony. Sarah had to restrain me from irrevocably ending Anglo-French relations with a mass killing.
Asked to move rooms the next morning as we'd been given the short straw and were sandwiched between the kitchen and the toilet meaning we woke up to hear a woman checking if her daughter had gone to the toilet properly which took about ten minutes - cheers love.
Did a big city walk around Chinatown (brilliant) and also taking in Union Square (surprisingly few scummers), Lombard Street (the 'crookedest street in the world' and it was) Coit Tower (built by a mental millionaire for firemen) and the Transamerica building (very cool pyramid shaped building) the next day.
Pretty knackered at the end of the day so chilled out in the hostel 'theatre' in the evening (right next to our new room, arrrgrgrhr) and watched 'Zodiac' about a San Franciscan serial killer (interesting choice).
Walked over the Golden Gate Bridge the following day (very impressive and gave great views of the city, possibly the best bridge of the trip so far arrrrrrrr) before getting the bus over and through the Haight (hippie central) to Golden Gate Park. Could have easily spent all day in the park as there's so much in there, but just checked out a few of the gardens and wandered over to the science and art museums before nearly having a coronary at the prices they charged - on a budget so didn't go in to either.
Went on the Alcatraz tour the next day which was really worth it and spent the whole morning wandering around 'The Rock' watching films about it and listening to the audio tour. The cells were really eerie and one of the guides showed us how to close all the cell doors with a single mechanism - VERY IMPRESSIVE. If only loud French schoolchildren could be locked up here.
Weather took a turn for the worse as we headed down to Fisherman's Wharf and Pier 39, but still got to see the sea-lions all having a bit of a lie down (lucky gits). Quite a few of them seemed to have smokers coughs though which was a bit concerning.
Woke up to torrential rain ready for our day trip to Muir Woods and the giant redwoods - perfect. Thankfully once our guide Tom had driven us to pick up the American family who'd be joining us it had stopped and cleared to glorious sunshine, very lucky.
Great morning followed as we wandered through the giant redwoods with Tom telling us loads of interesting info. We went really early as well which meant it was quiet which made it even better.
Got dropped off in the lovely town of Sausalito just over the bay and wandered around there before catching the ferry back into San Francisco Bay. Waited around for a bit and then got picked up for our tour to Yosemite (a 3.5 hour drive from San Fran) - a bloody long day.