Last day in San Francisco

So, today started foggy and not too bright.  But we did not let that deter us.  We dressed warm, took raincoats and headed off in the car to the Golden Gate Bridge.  Eric has already walked over it a couple of times on previous visits to the US for work, so today it was time for Karl, Robin and I to master the 1.2 mile trek.  The sun shone brightly upon us all the way, and it was a very pleasant walk.  Although, I now have the sore throat that Eric had before we went to Yosemite, so by the end of the walk, I was feeling a bit beat, and a bit breathless.  There are over a million rivets on the bridge - fact.  On average, one person jumps off the bridge ever other day - another fact.  In an effort to curb that, there are signs along the length of the bridge, with phones for people to use.

We met up with Eric in Marin County - he had parked and started walking towards us - and drove through to Saucilito, a small town about 1-2 miles from the bridge.  We stopped at a marina with house boats.  Turns out, it is one of very few privately owned (or could be only one, can't quite recall) co-op marina.  There were some interesting houseboats there, in different degrees of repair or otherwise.  There is also a small island in the marina, which is actually the remains of an old ship that used to travel from San Francisco to Tahiti in only 21 days.

Our next stop was the Mission District back in SF, and in particular, Mission Delores, the 3rd most northerly mission and the 6th of the 21 missions to be built.  The adobe walls were 4 feet thick, and it suffered no damage during the 1906 earthquake, whilst the church that was next to it at the time was destroyed (you can see a photo of it with hearses passing by below).  Pope John Paul II has been to the current Basilica, in 1987.  It was a lovely Mission and Basilica, and there are a number of graves of important early San Francisco families there, including the 1st Mayor and the 1st Governor.  There were 36,000 adobe bricks in the Mission, and 5,000 Native American Indians died building it due to diseases from white people.  There are stained glass windows honouring all of the 21 Missions in the Basilica.

We drove through Castro, San Francisco's centre for the gay and lesbian community and were going to get a biscuit or brownie from a famous shop, Hot Cookie (apparently shaped like private body parts - boys laughed at that idea!) but roadworks along the road put us off.  Instead we headed back to the hotel where we found ourselves locked out of our room - in error, Eric had not booked for tonight, but all our stuff was still as we had left it in the room.  Got that sorted, and got buses to Fisherman's Wharf, to go to Scoma's for their $5 bar menu - we ordered clam chowder in a sourdough bread bowl, crab cakes, and shrimp, as well as wine for Eric and I.  We weren't sure how the boys would go with it all - we had to buy 2 more clam chowders for us all to enjoy!  Scoma's is down a small alley, Al Scoma Way, on a wharf, but the food was great (thank you to Lawrence for the recommendation).

Dessert was an ice-cream in a cone or a hot chocolate from Ghirardelli's, along with free chocolate squares, of course!

Last activity of the day was a bus ride (on a bendy bus, much to the delight of Karl and Robin, who sat in the bend!) to go shoe shopping.  Eric likes the shoes here for the boys, and says they are cheaper, so instead of simply ordering them online as he usually does, he took the time to get the boys to try them on.  Oh, both Eric and I got a pair of shoes too!

Leaving San Fran tomorrow and heading south.  Two days to get to LA, along a scenic coastal road that is supposed to take about 12 - 13 hours to travel - the way we have been, it will take us twice that long!  My mum leaves NZ very soon, to meet us in Tahiti - exciting!