We've been having a cool time in San Fran for the last week or so but sadly now its coming to an end. Last weekend we met up with a friend, Kara, who we met in Cuba. Her and her friend picked us up Friday night and we went in to San Francisco to a bar. Had a nice time. Its very weird not being able to smoke in a bar though. When it closed, at around 2 we went and stuffed our faces at the drive-thru. The following day the sun finally came out and it was a lovely day. Barbara and Judy took us out sight-seeing for the day. Firstly we did the tourist thing and went to the Golden Gate Bridge, we walked across and looked at the view of the bay and the city. It was fleet week too so that meant there were lots of sailing boats in the bay and planes flying about doing their tricks - pirouetting, twisting and turning and dropping down from the sky really low with a trail of smoke!Then we visited the Muir Woods where there are gigantic Redwood trees which can reach up to 370ft tall! We walked along a trail accompanied by the strong smell of bay leaves and feeling very small in comparison to these giants. We came across hundreds of Ladybirds too, all in one spot mating, a kind of Ladybird orgy - v.weird!Then we went to Muir Beach, which is really pretty. There are some lovely big houses around there too. Afterwards we went out for an Indian, it was so yummy, much better than the last one. Probably the best samosas I've ever had and delicious curries too. The restaurant had a roof which opened up at one point, although I was too engrossed in my food to notice the sky. Luckily the weather stayed nice for most of the week and it was actually really warm for a few days. On Monday we went into the city, I had to take my baby to the doctor (my ipod to the Apple shop) as it isn't behaving itself at all. That was a weird experience in itself, inside the store they had a lecture room where they were doing seminars on how to use your ipod, people were actually attending (sad), and in order to see somebody I had to make an appointment with a 'genius' (modest) on a computer which was sitting right next to the person I wanted to see, then wait in line, it was all v.odd and it wasn't fixed. Grrr.We then caught an old vintage street car down Market Street which was fun! It was full of crazies, one of which wanted to take Nikki for dinner. We caught it up to the Castro district which is the gay centre of town, and really cool. We stopped for lunch at the Cafe Flore and watched the world go by. Then walked along Castro Street which is decorated with the rainbow flag and has shops selling all sorts of stuff from v.camp to hard-ware. I treated myself to a lovely ice-cream and we wondered the very steep side-streets to admire the lovely big Victorian houses, some of which were heavily decorated for Halloween.The next day we just chilled at the house, the restaurant the other day had only further encouraged our craving for curry so we cooked-up a big one for everyone, I couldn't find all the ingredients I needed so it was a bit of an experiment, and I tried some new things like Bombay potatoes and a raita dish, but it was a success and everyone seemed to enjoy it a lot. Well we all stuffed our faces anyway. On Thursday we went shopping in Oakland then we went to watch Abby (Barbara & Judy's daughter) in a cross-country race. The  fog had swept in so it was freezing! I felt extremely unfit watching all the teenagers running about. We went home and warmed up with a nice chowder soup (which Ive never tried before) cooked by Judy. Then we wrapped up warm and walked to the ice-cream shop, which made sense! Its a place called Coldstone's and I think I'm in love, you can pick from various ice-creams and goodies (chocolates, sweets, nuts, brownies, sauces etc) and they mush it all together for you. Mmmm. I had one with sweet cream ice-cream, fudge, caramel, pecan nuts and chocolate brownie! Damn that was goood!Yesterday, me, Nikki and Barbara went on a nice long bike-ride on a lovely bike path along the bay to Richmond, passing marsh-land, cute wooden houses, and where they used to build ships for the war. We stopped at a cafe by the marina then headed back. It was a nice, but kind of bum-numbing day. In the evening the 4 of us went to the cinema, I wont tell you what we saw because its embarrassing. Ok it was The Queen. Yes we came all the way to the US to see the bloody Queen! haha! It was pretty good though, some really good acting.Today is our last day here (boo), we may go to a party with Kara tonight, tomorrow we fly out to LA where we will stay with Kevin then the next day its Fiji! Oh my god!