89 Hours on a West Coast Adventure of Losing Our Heads in San Francisco

an overdue remembering of the trip that marked the middle of the academic term with exploring of an iconic American city

Exactly one month ago*, I was roaming around San Francisco. It was (almost) everything I wanted out of a quick trip down to California full with good food, great company, and stories to tell. There was a small bit of me that took this as a chance to evaluate my impressions of San Francisco against seeing myself on the grounds of the city for a clearer vision of whether or not I saw myself there in the future pursuing a career in the all-too typical tech industry. The answer was no — I think mostly because I didn’t tour any of the large companies but I saw enough billboards advertising software to establish that all of me wouldn’t thrive in SF. Now on to the fun part, the adventures, the countless steps, and the tourist-y life I prefer to live when meeting a new city like a new friend — starting with the basics, then asking all the questions.

*This has been in drafts since mid-March. I’m happy to announce that I am publishing this finally in April!

The four of us hopped into a car leisurely on Saturday morning and began our drive down to Seattle after a breakfast trip to Timmie’s. It was so much cheaper to fly out of Seattle than Vancouver and even though the timing wasn’t optimal, I thought it worked out quite well. A couple of Macklemore songs later, we made it to Seattle but oh so hungry. I had already been to Pike Place Market enough to know what I wanted — Beecher’s Mac & Cheese. Passing by the brewery, I picked up a few stickers, we found a cute pop-up of locals reminiscing on how Seattle has changed, found the gum wall, and roamed around the pier!

I’m glad the first day was as chill as this. It was a gentle transition into the amount of walking we’d do in the next few days. If you ever travel with me, well, you might not want to — I like to walk everywhere.

After encountering a borderline sketchy car parking lot, expensive airport food, and a slow Uber to take us to our hostel, we made it! And good night.

Weeeee, good morning! Our hostel, USA Hostels, was pretty good! Definitely as hip as I expect it to be with the walls quintessentially SF. We had a party of 4 and requested to be in the same room — oh wait, are their rooms bunks of 4? What a convenient way to get a private room without paying for one! After some basic oranges and toast, off we went!

Day 1 was “let’s walk around the city and all the piers” day.

Here are my tips/notes/thoughts:

• Cable Car | Take it from the starting point all the way down to Fisherman’s Wharf or anywhere really, but find a way to stand at the very front! (It doesn’t seem safe but I guess it is if you hold on tightly enough!)
• Ghirardelli Square | The downstairs of the Ghirardelli shop has a cute exhibit of how they make their chocolate! Tip: go to each section of the shop because they give you free samples!
• Fisherman’s Wharf | things to see, things to eat, piers to walk along
• a whole bunch of piers and more piers (maybe even pop by the Exploratorium while you’re at it?)
• Musee Mechanique | okay, this was a treat and a half. What a neat conglomeration of old toys.
• Coit Tower | I think the highlight of this hike up the mountain was seeing the houses that line the upward trail. The views up top (but at the bottom of Coit Tower) were nice.

I found a lot of aesthetic. Ooh, also Trader Joes with some of the cheapest bulk alcohol I had ever seen on this continent (Asia is another level).

Day 2 was “let’s go get some natural and tourist SF views” day!

• everyone who goes to SF must walk around Presidio, it’s lovely and lovely and all sorts of it. Here’s how we looped around!
• Starting with: Palace of Fine Arts | wow.
• Walk towards the water then along the beach Westward, you’ll hit a boardwalk eventually
• Follow the boardwalk! It’ll take you around to a perfectly timed rest stop and coffee if you need it.
• You’ll reach the touristy info hub for the Golden Gate! They have stamps in the tourist centre!
• Continue Westward and up the hill for these peepholes for you to identify what’s on the other side!
• Onwards! You’ll see a bunch of batteries (some still installed with weaponry, I think?), find a winding and fun trail to take pictures of the bridge from every angle, and rocks to climb on!
• That’s it! We spent about 4 hours in Presidio, and that was us at a leisurely pace and conquering most of it!

WHAT’S FOR LUNCH? | We found a Mexican place. I ordered this deep fried pocket of beef with guacamole and sour cream on top.

• Painted Ladies | Out of the way but was a neat neighbourhood to walk around and see the quaint houses!
• Japantown | It was sketchy, then we walked up stairs, then it wasn’t! We definitely took a back route to Japantown but it was a good time killer.
• Twin Peaks | I loved it. It was cold in February. But worth the views — come during sunrise or sunset or night.

Day 3 was that “ONE DAY MORE” day which we filled with food.

Somehow, we skipped over Lombard Street and walked over from our hostel to check it out. How interesting.

Our group split into two — one to In & Out, and the other to Swan Depot Oysters. The vibe, the kindness, the quality, and the window display of seafood at oysters was one of a kind. Swan Depot, you deserve all the hype.

We walked around Chinatown, I grabbed myself a pineapple bun, then we all reunited for some dim sum! To wrap it up, I did my obligatory US trip to the grocery store and found the one and only curry cup noodles. Canadian grocery stores need to start importing these. Breaking off from the group, I sought to walk as fast as possible through an unexplored part of SF where I found cheap tea, Target’s new home tech storefront, YBCA for a free art exhibit, and SFMOMA with enough time to explore its gift shop before close.

And that’s it! Voila! This has been sitting in drafts for two months. I’m sorry. I really am. Happy summer — the newly dubbed summer of refined and timely travel documentation.