Vacation Day 4: San Francisco

Tuesday: Anne was scheduled to work in the Valley so I had planned my typical tourist's day in the City for me and Jordan: visit to the office, cable car to Fisherman's Wharf, the sea lions at Pier 39, a Blue & Gold Bay Cruise and the Maritime Museum and Ghiradelli Square if we had enough time or happened to catch the right cable car.

Anne had borrowed my car for the day so Jordan and I walked down to the BART station with a stop at Starbuck's. Ah, how I have missed their hot chocolate. I decided to go with a tall, non-fat, sugar-free vanilla hot chocolate, no whip. It sure was good. Jordan got a caramel macchiato.

We were lucky it didn't rain on us on our walk because it did for the rest of the day. We got soaked and I wasn't very happy about it. I was super glad to have the poncho I bought on Saturday but even a nice poncho didn't stop my jeans and shoes and socks and bag from being drenched. I should've taken my umbrella as well but I thought it was going to be windy. I won't go on about it, I promise. It just wasn't a good day to be walking around outside.

So, anyway, we got to the office and I introduced him around, we both checked email and I did a spot of work. Katherine and Elizabeth accompanied us to lunch at the Thai hole-in-the-wall. Jordan was excited to try it out. I eat there at least once a week. He had the Penang curry with beef. I had Tom Ka Pak (coconut milk soup with vegetables).

Jordan wanted to stand on the outside of the cable car so we rode up to Fisherman's Wharf and saw the sights on the way. At the top of Lombard Street an SUV was waiting for the cable car to pass so they could go down the crookedest (supposedly) street in the world, the passenger put up her camera to take a photo of us and our so-picturesque cable car so I waved at her. She started laughing and waved back.

We ended up on the western end of the Wharf so stopped into the Maritime Museum for a rest stop and to get out of the rain for a bit. I thought we should head down and get our tickets for the cruise and then stop back at the museum afterwards. So we didn't really look at any of the exhibits (which I regretted later).

After getting our tickets we had about ten minutes before the boat left. So we went down to the end of Pier 39 where the hordes of sea lions hang out. There weren't so many as I've seen before. They must be somewhere else having babies or something.

When I got the tickets, the agent warned us that though they hadn't cancelled a trip yet that day, they wouldn't go without a minimum of 10 passengers. I thought that number would be just perfect. Kinda like the day before on the whale-watching trip. We could hang out in the comfort of the cabin and watch the sights go by protected from the rain.

Well, we started out in the cabin but when 500 (I swear!) Japanese tourists pressed themselves inside with us, I just couldn't stand it. I wish I would've asked to get off and take the next boat. It was miserable. I told Jordan I would rather sit outside in the rain than be stuck inside a steaming cabin with that many people. So we did. And we got really really wet. And it was my choice. At least we could see the City and the Golden Gate Bridge when we went under it.

Another advantage was that we were further away from the speakers. When I've gone on the Blue & Gold cruise before the audio was informative and entertaining, now they have changed it into some horrible theme park ride hosted by Captain Nemo. I may have to try out the Red & White cruise next time. Or just rent one of the little boats along the Wharf.

About halfway through the cruise we'd had enough of the pouring rain so we headed downstairs to be as close as we could to the door. We wanted out of there. The other people must've hated the trip as much as me cuz I had to squeeze my way out and then got stuck going up the gangway behind the slowest child with the slowest old lady.

Jordan was interested to see what kind of shops might be at Pier 39 and we'd seen a sign at the Marine Mammal Center displays by the sea lions that they had a shop somewhere as well. We looked around, made another rest stop and found the MMC shop. It wasn't much.

I had pretty much had enough of being soaked so Jordan agreed to head back home (though I was sad that we didn't get everything done we had wanted to do). We caught the street car down to the Embarcadero and BARTed home. I'm really glad that Jordan was so accommodating to his poor waterlogged aunt.

Anne got home soon after we did and we cooked more tacos and some garlic orange marinated shrimp. I made them watch American Idol and they made me watch House. It was a good trade.

Anne discovered that she had an early morning meeting the next day then would have the rest of the day off. Jordan and I had just planned on hanging out at the house but that plan was trashed in favor of another day in the City. One that just had to turn out better than ours.