San Fran!

Returned late last night from six full days in San Fran (you have to drop the ‘cisco part, or you have tourist written all over you…duh). What a fantastic, full week…here is a recap via highs and lows…

HIGH: Seeing Jessica and Luke…I have missed them o-so much…so much fun to visit and have adventures with friends in a new city…thanks for the invite and organizing!!

High: A gorgeous day for a baseball game at one of the nicest parks in baseball…immediately upon arrival to the city (I guess not immediately- we did drop our stuff off), we went to a Giants game- it was a 12:30 afternoon game, hence our 6am flight out of Seattle…the things we do for a baseball game, right. The stadium overlooks the water, and the view actually makes it tough to watch the game. It was windy, and certainly not warm, but the sun was out and the water was sparkling.

Low: That feeling you get once the travel adrenaline has run out and your body remembers it woke up at 3:45am. Oh, and the walk back from the game to the apartment under an overpass…a long walk without any pretty sights. A nap was very much needed.

High: Finding a Banksy in Chinatown. There is street art ALL over the city, and we figured there must be a Banksy somewhere…looked it up and discovered there was record of a few sprinkled around…on our first day of city adventuring (we walked from our place through downtown, Chinatown, North Beach, to Fisherman’s Wharf in the first part of the day), we found one in Chinatown. Of all the locations we went to, this was the only one that still existed (as far as we could tell anyway…maybe others were hidden from our sight). The discovery was exciting, as both Brian and I separately discovered the street art thing (my first intro to it was in Paris on an Urban Art tour through a meetup group I was in…was so interesting to me). As a side note- check out Exit Through the Gift Shop to get an idea of street art and Banksy in particular.

Low: Finding that the others on our list had been painted over…bummer.

High: Tartine in the Mission. A super yummy bakery recommended by a pal. I enjoyed some kind of blueberry almond tart thing and Brian had a piece of lemon meringue pie…both were amazing…I really would have liked to try everything in the case, as well as sat and had a sandwich with a coffee and people watch…had every intention of returning for more, but never was able. Boo…probably need to make a special trip out to West Seattle for a Bakery Nouveau delight very soon.

Low/High: Sea Lions at Fisherman’s Wharf…both hilarious and disgusting. The smell was not delightful, but the playing and barking were.

Moving on to the festival:
Lows:
- Waaaay overcrowded…it definitely felt like they oversold the festival. There were 3 main stages and it always felt like every stage was beyond its max.
- Weather on the first day was fuuuh-reezing. I knew it wasn’t going to be warm, and was prepared with a few layers, but that first day was borderline miserable with the cold dampness.
- The stages were set up too low. I don’t know what height a normal stage is set up at- how high above the crowd it is, how much the landscape makes a difference, or how much variance there is in a festival setting versus a regular show, etc…but this isn’t the first year of the festival- they aren’t rookies figuring stuff out. Only one of the three main stages was set at a height where the crowd could see anything, viewing from beyond the first small section. The actual main stage, where the headliners played, was not the one good stage. It was tough to see anything.
- The food…this was also a food festival, and the food booths were comprised of local restaurants and cafes…I had read some descriptions ahead of time and was suuuper excited for some good eats…and it was just eh. On the second day we actually stopped at Safeway on our way to the festival to grab sandwiches there. There were a couple of exceptions (to be found in the ‘highs’ area).
- Muni (the bus) rides home after the shows with a bajillion other people…hot and cramped.
- Thinking I was going to die from being squished near the front, for Arcade Fire- people just seem to forget there are other people.

Highs:
- Well, obviously being AT a music festival…definite high (speaking of festival highs, insert joke about the illegal substances being smoked everywhere…I would say especially the day that Phish played, but really, it was all three days).
- The weather on day 2 and 3 was amazing…chilly in the morning and colder at night, but the daytime was warm without ever getting uncomfortably hot.
- The park was SUCH a beautiful setting for the shows. It was at Golden Gate Park, which is GIGANTIC, and each stage area was surrounded by trees…it was really pretty.
- Catching Rhett Miller performing solo in a little tent that I didn’t even know existed…he is so dreamy.
- Music highlights included: Macklemore and Ryan Lewis (way to represent Seattle- such a fun show and pretty full considering it was the first show of the day), OK GO (lots of fun), Black Keys, Mavis Staples (couldn’t make it to church on Sunday, but who needs it when Mavis is singing…and a guest appearance by Win from Arcade Fire on a song), Josh Ritter, John Fogerty (just no end to the hits!), Decemberists (oh the dramatics…and little Sara Watkins from Nickel Creek!), Muse (pretty epic as the headliner the second night…), and Arcade Fire (minus the near death part at the beginning, they put on quite a show…it’s so great to see a band that genuinely seems like they are having fun up there and bring so much energy to this job they do night after night)….
- The Barbary tent…I think this space was missed by most…included random variety act-type entertainment…we made it for several different comedians.
- Sports tent…you don’t find that at most arts festivals…there were tvs with all the different games on, then air hockey, pop a shot, and other games. They also brought in the World Series trophy for pictures a few different times. We definitely found ourselves there a few times, to catch up on scores, warm up, and play some games in the downtime.
- On the third day, we realized the Food Truck Forest was probably the best place to get GOOD food…since the food truck is their THING (whereas the restaurants were cooking out of a booth…not their usual thing)…had a fried chicken sandwich with jalepeno slaw that was bomb. Also the Epic Cookies were pretty delicious. And the mini cupcakes- probably the best deal…$1 per cupcake…probably 9 different flavors. My fav was the blueberries and cream.

And our last day in Ess Eff- our flight took off at 8pm last night, so we had most of the day.

High: Renting bikes to ride across the Golden Gate Bridge- sooo exciting!

Low: Riding bikes in HILLY S.F…ohhh, there was definitely some walking the bike up the hills, and some soreness to follow.

High: Coming home. I loved the trip- really, the highs soooo, soooo outweighed any kind of low…but I love that I was excited to get home. That I have adventures and people here to look forward to pretty much every day (some might say overscheduled…), and a job that I don’t dread returning from vacation to…I’m a pretty lucky gal!