A Day Playing Tourist in San Francisco

I have lived in the San Francisco Bay area all my life and I work in downtown SF, but I rarely do touristy stuff around here. A co-worker of mine from the Hong Kong office of my company was in town, so it was time to put on my tourist hat and have a good weekend enjoying activities and sights that the tourists usually do!

Saturday morning started with a Segway tour of Aquatic Park and Fort Mason. For those of you who have never Segway'd before, it is REALLY cool! I had a lot of fun. They are controlled mainly by your feet... toe side you go forward, heel side you go backward (for those of you who have snowboarded before it is similar :-P ). To turn you use a controller that you twist it side to side. I didn't have any problems at all learning to ride the Segway - in fact I really took to it fast! It was an absolute blast and the weather was really nice. We couldn't have asked for a better day.

After the Segway tour, we took a walk on the Hyde Street pier and looked at all of the historic ships that they have there. We then took a stroll down along Fisherman's Wharf to Pier 39. At Pier 39 we did a little shopping. One of the things to do is to stop at the chocolate store - a tradition I have engaged in since I can remember. I also stopped at Na Hoku to replace the thumb ring that I lost last weekend :-( It is good that I have been losing a lot of weight but unfortunately my last thumb ring had become so loose that it fell off without me even noticing. The new ring fits quite snugly.

After we looked at the sea lions it was on to lunch. We had clam chowder, sourdough bread and salad with shrimp or crab on it. That clam chowder was good! It was time to start the driving tour of the day.

The driving tour started at Fisherman's Wharf (where we were parked) went through the Marina District, past the Palace of Fine Arts, and over the Golden Gate Bridge (we got out and walked on the bridge a bit and took pictures). The drive continued to the Seacliff area of SF with a brief stop at China Beach and Lands End. From there we drove past the Legion of Honor and down past the Cliff House for a stop at Ocean Beach. We dipped our toes in the Pacific Ocean and drove through Golden Gate Park next. We drove right past one of the waterfalls in my book but I didn't snap a pic so I need to go back! Our next destination was Twin Peaks where we enjoyed great views of San Francisco. By this time I decided that we needed to drive on the crookedest street in the world... Lombard Street! Coit Tower was our next stop (great views from there as well) and then a drive through North Beach and China Town to our dinner destination of Juban in Japan Town. I love Juban, it is one of my favorite restaurants! After dinner the day was over so I dropped everyone off and headed home.

It was a long day but a very fun day!