Touring San Francisco...

Good morning my friends!

We left Doug's house in Martinez this morning around 11AM to go back to San Francisco. We put the top down, because it was sunny, and warm, and we figured it was going to be a nice day to have the top down. What we didn't know though, is that once you get through a tunnel that from the valley takes you to the Bay Bridge of San Francisco, the temperature dramatically drops!

We went for a very welcoming 85F to 61F! Now, that is a big change!

It's amazing to witness all the micro climates here in the San Francisco Bay, changes in temperatures, weather conditions, etc. It might be sunny in the valley, but still foggy 20 miles away in the bay!

We parked the car at one of those private parking garages at the Embarcadero ($29 for roughly 4 hours, thank you very much!) with the idea of jumping on a Grey Line sightseeing tour on a motorized cable car through the streets of San Francisco, and so we did!

I must admit the parking garage had a beautiful view of the Bay Bridge, would that be the reason why it was so expensive? LOL

I usually try to avoid any kind of tour as most of the times they don't really reflect the real soul of the place you're visiting, but this morning I had some pain on the back of my left foot, and we therefore needed a "Plan B"!

We also wanted to do a cruise out on the bay, but changed our mind when the temperature continued to drop to somewhere in 50s once we got close to the Golden Gate Bridge, which today was partially surrounded by thick fog.

The tour also gave us the chance to see the Golden Gate Bridge from some new and different angles, and I particularly liked the one in the picture up above which has been taken from the South-East side of the bay.

Here's another shot of the starting point of the bridge, right after the Toll plaza:

The tour also gave us some useful information on San Francisco as a city and as a community that we really appreciated, I must admit our tour guide, other than being very pleasant (as they always are) was also very knowledgeable.

We also got some great new shots of the city, like this one down below with Alcatraz in the background, and met some interesting people:

When the tour was over, after about two and a half hours, we went back to the car, paid the $29, put the top down, the heat on, and decided to stay in San Francisco for the evening!

We visited some more places, like this Russian Orthodox Cathedral on the West Side:

And we also went by some REALLY authentic places, like this one in the picture down below (Yeah, RIGHT! LOL):

We had dinner at a very nice and tiny Italian Restaurant called "Aperto". It had raving reviews on the Internet, and so we decided to give it a try.

Ity was exactly what we wanted, we were probably the only tourist in the whole place, all of the other people were locals from the neighborhood! I loved it! :-)

Tomorrow we get back on the road and drive south to San Luis Obispo, through Monterey, Carmel, Big Sur, Hearst Castle, and hopefully many other things.

Now it's time to call it a day once again, hope you're having as much fun as I'm having.

Cheers,

Nico