San Fran: the whole shebang - Bay To Breakers

Where in the world do walking plants, gnomes, sasquatch, naked bottoms and texting bananas get together and unite?

At Bay To Breakers, one of the biggest parties in the world. And to think we almost left to go to a Travelodge on the edge of the freeway instead. We'd have missed the centennial of the event as well! Shame on us.

 

While the official race for the runners started at 7am, we headed out about 9am and wandered sheepishly (especially in Adam's case) through The Castro towards Haight St where the apparent action was.

When a guy passed us and asked "What's the occasion?" as he chortled along with his teeny dog, we started to worry. Americans don't do sarcasm. Do they? Oh dear. Maybe no one's going to be dressed up. Maybe we're just a bizarre group that consists of Rey Mysterio, a flamingo, a sunflower and a sheep/bunny hybrid walking the streets on a Sunday morning...

 How wrong could we be.

Thank you Fell Street. So dedicated are the party goers that they're pretty much all pished off their faces by about 10am. There's music everywhere - whether it's coming from someone's costume or one of the houses on the street.

In case you haven't realised yet, Bay To Breakers is the fancy dress Mecca - which makes incredible inspiration for future costumes. This one, in particular, blew me away.

A frickin' People Wash! With music and bubbles! Inspired.

My sunflower costume was a pretty big hit, if I do say so myself. And I only got used as a trash can once. If you can get into a flower pot, I urge you to try it. Much fun to be had! And if you happen to find a watering can in the shape of a flamingo, then think outside the box and make yourself a flam-bag (flamingo handbag, geddit?) a la Sian.

Here are some of the best costumes we saw (WARNING: you will see a wrinkly, naked old-man bottom below - there were lots of this sort of bottom on show on the day).

Head over to baytobreakers.tumblr.com for more pics from the day. You should spot me and Ad in there (on page 17) too!

I'll finish with me hanging out with the local flora. Bay To Breakers, you rock!

 

San Fran: the whole shebang - part 2

DAY 4:
We kept meaning to check out Haight Street properly and on Wednesday we got our chance. Super cool place. There are tons of great vintage shops. Loved To Death is a must-see. Especially if you're a fan of taxidermy momentos... No photos allowed in the shop - all the more reason to visit yourself.

From Haight we went west to Golden Gate Park, over 1,000 acres of urban green space. We missed Hippie Hill, unfortunately, because we drove in.

We went to the Conservatory Of Flowers next on the east side of the park. I'm as big a fan of plants as the next human being - they give us oxygen, they make your house look nice, etc etc. But there are only so many a person can look at before they all just look green.

Unless you're Adam, in which case you love plants because it's an excuse to get out your extension tube. See? Happy boy.

Hmm, carniverous plants. Yes, that's a bit more interesting...

Plants that can kill a man? That's more like it. And so we found the Wicked Plants exhibition, a collection of "botanical rogues and assassins". Who knew a cashew could be so toxic. Thrilling stuff. Seriously.

On the very west side of the park on the coast is a Dutch windmill. Just because (or more likely for a reason about which I didn't read). Nice bunting.

DAY 5:
It's Thursday, the sun is shining and what more breathtaking sight to behold than the Palace Of Fine Arts on the edge of the Presidio.

The Palace was built for the Panama-Pacific Exposition in 1915 - a key part of San Fran's rehabilitation from the earthquake of 1906. Very special. It's really near the Marina neighbourhood, so we wandered along the seafront and came across from fitness circuits. Allow Adam to demonstrate:

That, my friends, is a body curl. This is meant to be a bench leg-raise:

 

That's better.

The Marina is full of beautiful buildings - which would probably set you back a few million dollars.

Speaking of posh areas, I made Adam drive to Pacific Grove so I could take a picture of this house.

Fans of teen movies will recognise this from The Princess Diaries. Exciting, huh! I think it's the school building.

Next we drove back through the Presidio to walk the Golden Gate Bridge. We ended up in Sausalito by accident, which was a happy mistake as it looked lovely but we just drove through and up to the Marin Headleads as we were short of time. The view was worth the $6 we had to pay to get back over the bridge.

When we got back we parked at Fort Point (which was our very first stop in San Fran when we arrived) and battled the wind to walk two-thirds of the way across.

DAY 6:
On Friday, we drove down the 280 to Stanford University near Palo Alto where my friend Jo (Allie's sister) is studying. She is one lucky girl. This place is unbelievable. Unbelievable enough to make me want to go right back to uni right now. As long as it's at Stanford, though. Cardiff can't compete with this.

This church is on campus. You couldn't photograph the inside of the building but I can tell you that it was beautiful. It was really hard to retain the requested silence inside when you're in a building so amazing you want to shout about it.

Next, Jo took us up the Hoover Tower (interestingly, it's a conservative think-tank) for a bird's eye view of the university. Pretty much all Stanford's campus as far as the eye can see.

I could have stayed there all day. But we had a lunch date with the pie at the Peninsula Creamery in Palo Alto. And it was some pie. Apple, in case you're wondering, which was better than Adam's Cherry Crunch.

The guy behind me had french toast with fruit syrup. Normal enough (his choice of brunch, not my stalking his food). But he also had a separate plate of two fried eggs. Only in America?

Just up from the Creamery we found a book dealers that was full of cool second-hand books. Adam bought a book on English photography, as you do when you're in the States, and I got a Ringling Brothers programme from 1975, obsessed as I am with circus culture since reading Water For Elephants (incredible book).

From Palo Alto, we joined Highway 1 and drove up the coast back to SF through Half Moon Bay and Pacifico, where we stopped at Sea Bowl. It had an American flag at the foot of the lanes and everything. Authentic American bowling.

(According to the formatting of on-road instructions, and indeed doormats, it seems that Americans can only read the word nearest to them first.)

DAY 7:
Saturday and the day we were meant to be leaving (again). We didn't. Bay To Breakers was but half a day away and, by golly, were we glad we stuck around. This footrace-cum-fancy-dress-piss-up was WELL worth staying for. We spent Saturday afternoon constructing our costumes, made exclusively (mine and Sian's pretty much anyway) from the wares of Cliff's Variety in Castro, a magical place stocking anything you could ever need. Including a flower pot you can wear and a flamingo handbag.

You'll have to wait a day or two for the complete blog on this one, but it will be worth it.

I PROMISE.

San Fran: the whole shebang - part 1

We were only planning on staying for four nights... that turned into nine. Whoops. Luckily Adam's fine cooking and my fancy-dress-making skills stopped Sian and John from kicking us out.

*WARNING: these are image-heavy posts but it would do San Fran an injustice to try and condense all the fun. So here goes....

DAY 1:
Sian and John were around on the Sunday (which also happened to be Mother's Day over here) so we headed to Mission for brunch. Turned out that it was Mission's turn for Sunday Streets, "San Fran's official block party", where they shut off all the streets to vehicles and pedestrians and bikes take over. We were super lucky to stumble across this. Mission sure knows how to block party.

You've seen this guy before. But he's worth another post. He had some MOVES. Even some to rival yours, Llewellyn. Plus, we came across an impromptu gig from an apartment window. The guy was playing some pretty sweet slide guitar.

Ad made friends with some cheeky clowns for a bit of putting. He lost.

There are murals everywhere. This is the Clarion Alley Mural Project.

Valencia Street is packed with amazing shops. Needless to say, the plastic took a battering.

Later on, we sampled John's Official San Francisco Soft-top Tour. Highly recommended. It took in Twin Peaks, Lombard Street aka the Crookedest Street, Haight Street, the Painted Ladies at Alamo Square, Little Italy, Downtown and Ocean Beach.

 

That's Sian taking a photo of me telling Adam not to stand up in the back of the car. He didn't listen... but it made for a good picture.

DAY 2:
Today, we explored from Downtown and Union Square (where we had a slice from the Cheesecake Factory: overrated), up the Grant Avenue part of Chinatown to Little Italy, across to the Cable Car Museum (where we stocked up for our growing collection of American fridge magnets), to Powell & Hyde for a cable car ride down to Hyde Street Pier where we headed aboard the boats/ships/liners (delete as appropriate, I've no idea), then to Fisherman's Wharf to play on the vintage arcade machines at Musee Mecanique, have our photobooth pictures taken and eat clam chowder from a bread bowl.

 

Day 2 was also the day that we first ate a Snickerdoodle. Still don't quite know what they are (cookie? cake?) but I know that I hope it's not the only Snickerdoodle we ever eat.

DAY 3:
It's now Tuesday. Time for Alcatraz. Incredible audio tour. If you ever go to San Francisco, make sure it's on your must-visit list.

We went back to Fisherman's Wharf to go to the ever-tacky and stinky-sealion-inhabited Pier 39 (they had a whole shop of magnets, what can I say?), then climbed Filbert Steps right to Coit Tower on the peak of Telegraph Hill. Steep. We took the elevator to top (I wouldn't bother if I were you; the view from the car park is just as impressive and you'll save yourself 10 bucks. Although the view of Lombard St from above is pretty cool).

We headed back down Filbert Steps. Apparently, parrots live in the gardens. We didn't see any but the gardens themselves are incredible enough. At the bottom you hit Levi's Plaza and the Levi Strauss HQ. They have a ton of vintage and salvaged jeans and jackets in The Vault. Well worth a look, if only to see how massive Elton John's custom denim is!

On the way to the Ferry Building (lots of lovely shops and markets) from Levi's Plaza we found the chocolate shop/factory that Sian had recommended at Pier 17, Tcho Chocolate. Quite possibly the only proper chocolate in America, which it should be for $20 a sampler. We could only afford the drinks. But their hot chocolate is gooood - with that many o's.

OK, that's more than enough for part 1. Part 2 coming soon.