San Francisco

A couple of weeks ago I had to go to San Francisco for a work conference. It was a very busy trip, but we did have time for a 2 hour bus tour! I was there with a friend I work with so we made the most of that 2 hours. The rest of the 4.5 days I was there were spent inside conference rooms!

 Ghiradelli Chocolate Co. YUM!!

If you look close, and don't mind the blur, you can see Alcatraz over my right shoulder.

This was taken from the bus. Can you tell ;-) We did go back and eat there.

This is why we took a bus- those hills are steep!!

This is the church where Joe DiMaggio and Marilyn Monroe were married. It wasn't a stop on the tour, but I wish it would have been!! Attached to the church is also an elementary school where all the DiMaggio brother's learned to play baseball. So fun!

The Painted Ladies. A row of Victorian homes that are quite famous. Full House, anyone?

It was amazing to me how so many houses were in such a small area. I have also been told that there is a chance that pine tree is actually a cell phone tower.

Can you see the Golden Gate Bridge?

View of downtown from Twin Peaks.

This is the entrance to the Japanese Flower Garden. This was as close as I got. It was only a 2 hour tour.

1. The orange signs were everywhere. Giants in the playoffs and then winning the World Series was obviously a big deal!

2. Can you see the fog on the horizon?

This is what the fog looks like up close. We were about to cross the Golden Gate Bridge!

As we crossed the bridge, we drove out of the fog. We were happy to get a clear view!

City in the fog.

This was the best part of the tour!

After the tour, we went to the Fisherman's Wharf to have lunch. This place had great fish n' chips as well as sourdough bread!

No trip to San Francisco would be complete without a cable car ride!

{on a side note, we went to this city target once a day- it was awesome! BUT you had to pay $.10 per bag or you had to bring your own. Very interesting, it was a city ordinance!}

Back to the cable cars.

This is why the cable cars were invented. This hill is so steep it makes the tallest building in San Francisco (the pointy one) look short...

Riding down the hill was a little like a slow roller coaster.

This was the conference I attended. The American Public Health Association. I won't bore you with the details, but it was a REALLY good conference!

While we were there the SF Giants won the World Series. It was crazy! On the day we left for the airport they had a ticker tape parade... it started right as we needed to get to the subway to go to the airport... I'm pretty sure I rolled over some toes with my suitcase but I couldn't even stop to apologize. The news estimated that 1 million people lined the parade route- I believe it!!

 I took these before we started our fight to the subway tunnel. The parade route went over the subway line. We had no other choice but to brave the madness :)

I was ridiculously happy to be home and see Kenny and the kids. I missed them SOOO much!! :) It's always good to come home.