This has been a great holiday for me... I think back in High School was the last time two weeks off "work" had this much meaning. I'm beginning to understand more and more why people value their holiday so much.
I've really come to like this place. Sure it's a little dirty (something about the streets? I'm not sure what), and a little depressing (the number of homeless people), but then it has this amazing sense of being just like Wellington only bigger. It makes me want to explore the rest of the US even more than I did before. Apparently people complain about the fog, but to be honest I haven't noticed it. Though it's been there I'm told. Their current mayor is also working on better ways of dealing with the homeless than just "here's money, get lost", which surprise surprise appears not to actually work.
On Tuesday (Day 9) I headed out to Fisherman's Wharf, to see what I could see. I managed to get myself some sunburnt arms, and a rather sunburnt face, but I had a lot of fun. I saw their Aquarium (quite like Kelly Tarlton's in Auckland, and similarly expensive), I went on a cruise, and took 170 photos. I figure I can only ever get better with practice. Flickr saw 60 of those. I finished it by enjoying some Ben & Jerry's Icecream, as did some other people.
On Wednesday (Day 10) I went out to see Muir Woods, and headed further up into Sonoma Valley to do some serious (well, ok, not really serious) wine tasting. Saw Valley of the Moon, baught wine at Larson Family Winery (they had a llama!), and had a tour of and drunk wine, and bought a bottle, at Gloria Ferrer. We stopped and took photographs at the Golden Gate bridge (one, two and three). I ended the day more sunburnt than I was when I left. Hopefully this will leave me with a good tan.
Today (Day 11) I went out to Alcatraz (photos awaiting upload), and boy did it rain. I mean it stopped when I went inside, and started up again as soon as I had to be outside for any length of time. Great site, glad I got my water shots earlier in the week however, because although a dark dreary sky suits Alcatraz, I think it looks nicer against a brilliant summer San Francisco sky. The audio tour was definately worth hearing, even though at times I lost connection with where exactly I was meant to be looking. I had a proper hot dog from a (not quite) street vendor, which surprisingly was actually really good.
When it came to dinner tonight though I stepped out of the hostel, and instead of heading down Taylor (towards Market), as per usual I turned up (towards Bush). This proved to be a great move because I discoverd a great little Mexican place that served good sized helpings of good tasting food with a basketball game on (finally saw some American TV ads!), for quite a reasonable sum. I bought a pastry on my way out, came back to the hostel, flooded flickr some more, and did some laundry.
If you haven't already, please take a look at this trips photos. I know there are 276 in there at the time of posting (another 35 to go in shortly), but I think at least some of them are worth viewing. There are people in some of these (something I've often been afraid of), and some beautiful scenery that I couldn't possibly hope of being good at capturing. I'm not promising great photos (some day, maybe), but maybe when I talk to you about this trip you'll be able to go "oh yeah, I saw that photo". I've kept about 810 on my PowerBook (now known as stephanie. I really like that name.), so sometime I'm sure I can bore you with even more if you ask.
I should probably sleep now, have to be up early(ish) to check out pack, and do some last day shopping and eating before heading out at 6:45pm to the airport to catch a plane back to a country that won't kick me out in two months. (Er, hopefully.)
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