Saturday we got up bright and early, packed lots of snacks, packed a borrowed San Francisco guide, and drove into the city… Our first stop was Baker Beach in the Presidio. There was a sign placed by the path to the beach warning that people had drowned there while both swimming and just wading. I believed it when I saw the size and violence of the waves hitting that beach. At times the noise was so loud that we nearly had to shout to hear each other.
We made our way down the beach, all the while with the Golden Gate Bridge in our sights.
At the end of the beach there were some pilings… and I attempted to climb one and sit on top of it. I just ended up humping it kind of awkwardly and getting a few splinters. I even tried bringing over a piece of driftwood to stand on top of to give me a bit more leverage. I only gave up when that piece of wood nearly fell out from under me and left me dangling in the air. I think if I had my climbing shoes it would have been possible, but my chucks just didn’t quite cut it. (It was still fun though.)
After we had our fill of the beach we hopped into the car, consulted our directions, and headed for our planned parking garage for the rest of the day. We quickly got lost, despite all the best laid plans, and ended up driving down Lombard Street. The curviest (and arguably steepest) road in the city. (Don’t worry, I didn’t stall the slugmobile and roll into the car behind me at the stop sign on the 10% grade.) After some consulting of our city guide and maps we managed to work our way to the parking garage. After all that work we were hungry… so we ate sushi in Japantown.
We spent the afternoon exploring the area around the embarcadero. There were a bunch of local artists showing and selling their work under tents by the ferry building. We did some browsing, and Beth ended up buying some glass pendants from an artist originally from Londonderry… small world. We explored the fountain and the strange head sculptures. A nice lady with a French accent offered to take our picture goofing off and imitating the grimaces on the heads, but she failed multiple times to get us both in the picture without cutting half of one of our bodies off.
After that we made our way back towards Chinatown in order to stake out a spot on the sidewalk for optimal parade viewing. We waited for an hour for the parade to start, munching on snacks and chatting with the people around us. Kathleen showed up to join us in watching the parade just as it was starting.
The parade was definitely an experience. There were dancing lion troops, spinning teacup people, strange giants on stilts with fireworks at their feet, lots of drum beating, gong smashing, and cymbal crashing, bright glittering floats, multiple dragons a half a block in length carried by at least 20 people, and lots of the color red. The spinning people in teacup costumes wore triangular red sequined hats… and since their hands were trapped in their costumes it must have been hard enough to stay standing after jumping around and spinning, not to mention when your hat slips down over your eyes. I watched one teacup nearly careen into the crowd. His “handler” on the side had to catch and right him, then readjust his hat so he could see again.
My favorite part of the parade was definitely all the dancing lion troops. Two people make up one lion. One for the head, and one for the rear. Most lions had a permanent head and rear… but I watched as one young lion, from a local elementary school, flipped its head and rear when the rear grew tired and began sagging and lagging behind. The lions interacted with the crowds as they made their way down the street. When they came upon a particularly rambunctious section they became even more spirited. Their eyelids and mouths flapped open and shut, they stood up on their hind legs and shimmied their butts.
There were also lots of strange costumes of people, which I’m sure had significance, but what I don’t know. Kathleen said she thought it had something to do with ancestors… all I know is that this guy was kind of creepy.
The dragons were exciting anytime they appeared, and there were many to keep the crowd pleased.
After the parade we were extremely hungry… and cold. So we made our way to Chinatown where we explored some trinket shops, then made our way to a restaurant to eat some real Chinese cuisine in Chinatown. After dinner Kathleen and Beth were drawn into a bakery where they bought authentic pastries for cheap. While they were battling the crowd in the shop I wandered the street a bit and took in the architecture and art.
After wandering around a bit more we decided to call it a night, made our way back to the garage, and managed to find our way out of the city on the first try. (Definitely not Boston driving where the route you need to take changes nearly every week due to some construction project, most likely related to the Big Dig.)
The next day we slept in a little, did some research, and then headed to Sonoma for the afternoon to visit a combined vineyard and olive oil press. While there we did a wine tasting and explored the building, which was an exact replica of the Jacuzzi family home in Italy.
The place was rather fancy. It even had a huge open room with barrels stacked along the walls, candles burning, stained glass windows, and a 3 piece mural from a cathedral in France. This may have been my favorite place on the “estate.” The room smelled sweet, like wine saturated wood, from the barrels along the walls. Nora and I did ballet jumps, cartwheels, and round-offs with our shoes off in the open space.
The back courtyard was complete with a fountain and benches where you could sit and look out over part of the vineyard. We naturally identified any birds we saw.
We felt a little out of place, being the non-classy field biologists that we are. (much more comfortable drinking whiskey and sitting in carharts and flannel) That and we butchered the pronunciation of nearly every wine we wanted to try. Our “bartender” was extremely nice though, and gave us all a lesson on the history of the Jacuzzi wine and family, and educated our fledgling wine connoiseuring skills. We left a little wiser, a little happier, and with 2 bottles of very classy wine.
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